Enough For Now
by SongofJoy
Summary: They've both said it is.  Is it really? Are they fooling themselves? Or do either of them really believe the lie?
1. Chapter 1

_It's enough for now. It's enough for now. It's enough for now. _

Her own words pounded through her mind, matching the staccato tune that her feet were currently drumming against the cement. She knew he thought she'd been talking about her mother's case, the need to give it some time, the conversation they'd tabled earlier. And she was … on one level. It _wasn't_ enough to do as he'd advised. It meant she had to pretend that nothing had changed, to bury the anger and the fear and the guilt and move past the overwhelming sense of urgency that engulfed her every morning as soon as she opened her eyes. It meant that the wall stayed.

_I remember everything._

If she let herself, she could still feel the gentle pressure of his body as he cradled her. The trembling caress of his hands numbing her to the burning pain. His whispered pleas calling her back from the darkness that screamed its own invitation. The haunting panic in his eyes clashing with the surprised defeat in hers.

She'd known even that day in the hospital when she told Castle she needed more time – known that her safe and comfy relationship with Josh would never again be able to maintain the illusion of "enough". Not when she knew that Richard Castle – the man who could make her toes curl with just the brush of his hand against hers in passing – loved _her. _

Shaking herself to stop the memories – and her current train of thought – from invading further, Kate Beckett leaned against a nearby tree to catch her breath.

_Why?_

The unspoken question bounced through the recesses of her mind, and she closed her eyes against a sudden rush of emotion. Because … the wall stayed. And the wall taunted. Because the wall won.

_For now._

She cursed under her breath as she began running again. He loved her. The thought invaded anyway, and it brought a new wave of tears in its wake.

_Kate… I love you._

Darn him.

_I love you, Kate._

"Darn him." Her breathless words mingled with her tears, her breath coming in short, pained bursts that were visible in the crisp air. She veered off the path and stopped by the stone wall that bordered the park. Under the guise of stretching her tense muscles, she placed a hand against the damp cool surface and curled her fingers into a fist – as though pummeling the wall in front of her would shatter the wall inside her.

She had lied, claiming a non-existent amnesia so she didn't have to deal with the fact that her best friend loved her. She had pushed him away, retreating into herself so she didn't have to deal with the fact that she loved her best friend. It was her way. And it would continue to be as long as the wall stayed.

And the wall stayed as long as her mother's case remained open.

_I lied_.

She'd lied about forgetting. How could she possibly forget? Everything about that day was seared permanently into her brain … parts of it indelibly etched into her heart.

She'd lied about it being enough for now. It wasn't. Not when it came to her mother's case. Not when it came to her relationship with Castle. Not. Nearly. Enough.

Hitting the wall with her balled fist, she ran her hands through her hair and drew a shaky breath. She pushed away from the stone wall in defiance and headed back in the direction of her apartment. The familiar argument began again, her thoughts once more taking up the rhythm of her steps. She ached – literally, ached – deep within her spirit. Her mind stayed true to her resolve. Her heart begged her to not to give up.

_It's enough for now. It's enough for now. It's enough for now._

Maybe if she kept repeating it to herself, one day she'd start believing it.


	2. Chapter 2

**~*~ Disclaimer that I forgot in Chapter 1: I don't own Castle or any of the other characters. ~*~**

_It's enough for now. _

It had to be.

He couldn't lose her again. Not to a sniper's bullet. Not to her own stubbornness.

Those three months without contact were torture. Three months of nightmares. Three months of self-recrimination. Three months of a deeper ache in his heart than he'd ever experienced.

She would probably never have any idea how many different emotions slammed through him when he saw her standing in front of him at the book signing. Relief. Hurt. Anger. Hope. Love. They all did battle for which would dominate – none of them really won. Or maybe they all did. He didn't know.

Joining her on the swings struck him as ironic even then. More so with each replay of their conversation in his mind. Swings implied carefree moments, childish giggles, and playful fun. Yet, as he sat next to her that day, he certainly did _not_ feel carefree or playful. The giggles were nowhere to be found, but he did feel a bit like a child – vulnerable and defenseless against what the next few moments might hold.

_Does she make you happy?_

His daughter's question had been a loaded one. The easiest answer had been the one he gave. Yes, Kate made him happy. And angry. And sad. And confused. She made him want to wrap her long hair around his fist and tug her into a kiss that left them both breathless. She also made him want to pull his own hair out in frustration. In the same heartbeat.

_Is it enough?_

No.

_It's enough for now._

But it wasn't really. Not anywhere close to enough.

But it was better than nothing.

He knew what he was doing when he asked her to put her mother's investigation on hold for a while. He knew the implications. On the one hand, she would be safe. On the other, the wall stayed firmly in place – keeping the status quo of their relationship … well, status quo. The very fact that she remained alive, however, left open the door for hope. Hope that swelled only to plummet with the next breath drawn, a roller coaster of anguish that was still better than the alternative. He could live with the way things were forced to stay – because it meant _she_ lived.

_It's enough for now._

But not forever. She was it. She was the only one he wanted, the only one he _needed_. In many ways, despite his two failed marriages, she was his 'one and done' – the first woman to stir in him this cacophony of love and passion and lust and protectiveness and chivalry all swirled together. No one else ever came close – nor would any other woman ever hold a candle to her.

_It's enough for now._

She'd said that she wouldn't be able to have the kind of relationship she wanted until her mother's case was solved. He swiveled in his chair, dropping his feet off the desk to the floor. After all … just because he'd managed to discourage _her_ from working on her mother's case right now, that didn't mean _he_ had to refrain. He glanced at the flat-screen on his wall and tapped his finger against his chin. There _had_ to be something in all those files, in all those faces that stared back at him. The sooner he found it, the sooner the case could finally – _finally_ – be put to rest.

And then so could the wall.

_It's enough for now._

But only because it had to be.


	3. Chapter 3

Exiting the elevator, Rick Castle forced a carefree spring into his step as his eyes sought out her slender form. An easy smile twitched across his lips when he spied her in the Iron Gates' office. Her back was to him but her body was unmistakably recognizable to his experienced gaze. He placed her coffee next to her computer to await her return and settled himself in his chair, debating only a few seconds before he rakishly propped his feet up in the seat she'd left pushed away from her desk.

Closing his eyes and locking his fingers together behind his head, he waited, imagining all the possible – and a few fun but improbable – ways Kate would react. He was not disappointed when his feet were unceremoniously dropped to the floor, her chair swiveling out of reach. His eyes opened with a flirty twinkle– just in time to watch her lithe fingers flick him in the nose.

"Ow," he groused, rubbing the offending bit of skin.

"You've had worse."

Kate focused astutely on her monitor, but he didn't miss the small grin that she didn't try hard enough to squelch.

"What did Gates want?"

She opened her mouth to answer, her attention diverted by the sudden entrance of the no-nonsense chief in question.

"Officers, I will be out of the office most of the day for meetings at City Hall." Gates scanned the room, her face daring anyone to seem relieved. "While I'm gone, Detective Beckett is the point man. I have briefed her as to my expectations."

With one more school-marmish glance around the bullpen, she had swept from the room and was gone from sight. Ryan and Esposito waited a few beats before scurrying silently after her, returning in mere seconds to give the waiting officers a thumbs-up to indicate she had indeed left. A collective sigh seemed to ripple through the bullpen, the oppressive presence of their chief giving way to the sweet taste of freedom – however temporary.

"What kind of briefs does a woman like her wear?"

Castle's husky whisper tickled her ear, and Kate shot him a look that was not nearly as withering as she had meant it to be.

"Granny panties," he murmured, seeking her confirmation with raised eyebrows. "I bet she wears granny panties." He drummed his fingers on the edge of Kate's desk. "Or maybe boxers. I mean, she does make us call her 'sir'…"

A bubble of laughter escaped from Kate's throat before she could stop herself. She didn't dare look at him – she knew the smug look he would be sporting by heart. "Oh Castle," she breathed, shaking her head fondly in the general direction of the big lug. The sense of normalcy that enveloped her was eagerly welcomed. "Enough for now" did have its moments of truth.

Keeping her eyes fixed on the email she was answering, lost in her thoughts, she started when his breath again grazed her ear canal.

"I bet you're more of a thong kind of girl."

Acting like she hadn't heard him, Kate pushed away from her desk, a folder of completed case file paperwork in one hand. She paused only long enough in her journey to the archives to tweak his nose with a rapidity that sent his own coffee cup sailing through the air.

"Sandals! I meant sandals," he laughed, his hands raised in surrender, his nose still held captive.

She stole his breath as she leaned over him, a sultry gleam to her green eyes. "Good. Cuz I'd hate to have to break in a new shadow after all this time."

Releasing his nose with one more twist for good measure, she left him to stare after her as she headed for the elevator. She paused in the doorway and made sure she had his attention. "Hey Castle? They're red."

To his questioning look, she added, "My … sandals."

Pivoting on her heels, she sashayed a bit more than usual as she left his line of sight. A small thrill fluttered through her stomach at the dumbfounded, completely flummoxed expression that had crashed across Castle's face with her saucy rebuttal. Sometimes, he really was just too easy.

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	4. Chapter 4

**~*~ Thank you SO much for the reviews! It makes me happy ... and when I'm happy I write fuzzies :P**

Kate ran her index finger idly around the rim of her glass. It was empty, and she was debating the merits of asking the bartender to fill it back up. She shot an absent smile in the direction of her friends – her coworkers – their rambunctious antics tugging at her stubborn bout of melancholy that refused to lift.

Castle watched her from his perch across the room, his heart aching at both her beauty and her apparent sadness.

"You two are gonna be the death of me," Lanie muttered under her breath, slapping his shoulder when he glanced at her in confusion.

"Huh?"

She glared reproachfully. "Why don't you go talk to her?"

"It's … complicated," he offered weakly in defense.

The medical examiner snorted. "It's _always_ complicated. That's life." She covered one of his hands with hers. "That's _love_."

He shifted uncomfortably for a moment before plastering his trademark charming grin to his face and leaning forward. "Why, Dr. Parish! I didn't know you had feelings for me?"

Lanie set her glass down with a distinct "klunk" and turned to the man seated next to her. "Javi – can I kill him now?"

"Why so glum, KB?"

His murmured question and that darn sexy voice of his sent a tremor down her spine.

"Not glum," she fibbed, swiveling her barstool the fraction that was necessary to face him. He was leaning close to her, too close if the sudden cobwebs in her brain were to be believed. "Just thinking."

"About your mom's case?" His eyes caressed her face in concern.

Kate hesitated. "That… and other things."

He pursed his lips in silent understanding, nodding slightly and plucking the empty glass from her hands.

"C'mon, Beckett," he commanded, his voice dipping low and quiet to add, "I know what you need."

_You_. The thought rose unbidden in her mind, and she shoved it away. She hoped the raw desire that he stirred in her hadn't flashed through her gaze. He would know her too well to miss it.

Captivated by the way her eyes darkened with swirls of lust, he cleared his throat and forced his voice to function. "You need to dance with me." His fingers – and other parts of his body – twitched with the need to hold her.

"I really don't, Castle." She beckoned for the bartender and retrieved her glass, holding it up to indicate her desire for a refill.

Castle sighed at the return of her defenses. He waved the confused man away, preventing him from getting very far with the embattled glass, swiping it back into his own possession when the bartender hesitated.

"Rick," she breathed in exasperation and rolled her eyes.

"Doctor's orders," he insisted with a nod in Lanie's direction. Kate let her eyes drift toward the corner booth where Lanie and Esposito were trying to pretend that they hadn't been cuddling. As though the ME knew what Castle had said, she gave Kate an encouraging nod and a wink.

Kate groaned in half-hearted protest as Castle tugged on her fingers, slowly drawing her body off the stool and into an uncluttered portion of the room. Music pulsed from the speakers. His hand enveloped hers. His other hand rested at her hip with the softest of touches. "Please, KB?"

She chuckled at his puppy dog eyes and looked away for a minute, catching her bottom lip between her teeth.

He leaned closer, and she held her breath, her shoulders tense. "I'm not asking for the wall to come down, Kate."

Her gaze crashed into his, startled.

His lips were saying, "Just one little dance between friends." His eyes were saying, _It's enough for now._

Nodding thoughtfully, she let her body relax in a silent assent and his rugged face was suddenly swathed in a delighted smile. He led them in a slow, casual sway, punctuated only by the occasional spin toward another section of the room – meant to coax some merriment from wherever she'd buried it. It didn't seem to matter to him that the current song was more of a hip-hop beat. They danced to a song only he heard. Instead of raw sexiness, he seemed to be shooting for tender sensuality. He was succeeding.

She let him draw her closer and felt her heart lurch in her chest. Oh yes, he was succeeding. Pushing deep her reservations and the panic that accompanied them, Kate gave in to the moment and relished the feel of his body gently brushing against hers.

Her head moved of its own accord, drawn involuntarily to the broad expanse of flannel-shirt-covered chest in front of her. His hand slid from her hip to the small of her back, his breath hitching in contentment when she rested her cheek on his shoulder with a small sigh.

They moved together as one person in a companionable quiet … until Kate's voice broke the silence like a gunshot.

"I lied."


	5. Chapter 5

The words tumbled out of her mouth before she could halt them, a look of horror freezing her face into a wide-eyed stupor. Grateful that he couldn't see her expression, given that she was still resting her head against his shoulder, Kate scrambled to come up with an explanation other than the truth. Again.

"Uh… about my … sandals," she blurted inanely.

Castle paused, his hand flexing against her back as arousal slammed into him. Why in heaven's name had he started that whole line of conversation in the first place? It was playing with fire, and he knew it. So did his body.

"Ah, yes," he murmured more casually than he felt. "The red thongs."

Kate nodded against his shirt, and he didn't miss the slight tremor that overtook both the hand he held and the hand that cradled his neck.

"Are you telling me that they're not really red, Beckett?" Another thought drifted mischievously through his lust-fogged brain, and like an idiot he heard himself giving voice to it. "Or … are you telling me that you're wearing any … sandals … at all?"

She heard the husky growl that coated his words in a delicious sexiness that made her falter against the easy sway they had established.

"I'm not wearing … sandals," she confirmed for him, grinning as the hand at her back tightened almost violently, the force rocking her more intimately against him. He moved his hold to her hip again, and his breath hissed through his teeth as he fought for control.

"It's fall," Kate continued rambling, unable to stem the flow of syllables that kept leaving her voice box. "It's too cold for sandals in New York in the fall. More like boot weather, actually."

Groaning softly, he whispered his next question against her ear. "Are boots a code for granny panties?"

She pushed back from his hold just enough to whack the back of his head in a move that would have Leroy Gibbs proud. "Would you quit using that word?"

"What?" he smirked boyishly, then leaned closer until his nose nearly nuzzled her own. "Panties?"

Rolling her eyes, she made as if to repeat the "Gibbs-slap" but her gesture was easily prevented as he recaptured her hand with his. He lifted her fingers to his lips and brushed a soft kiss along her knuckles, noticing with pleasure how shallow her breathing had suddenly become.

"Don't destroy every fantasy about you that I've ever had, Kate" he pleaded in his most persuasive whine. "Please tell me you don't wear granny … _undergarments_."

She laughed. She couldn't help it. He brought it out in her, whether or not he knew it. "Get your mind out of the gutter, Castle," she admonished with a bemused grin. "I was talking about boots. Not undergarments. Footwear."

Heaving an exaggerated sigh of resignation, Castle drew her back into their dance, easily establishing anew the rhythm that they had found earlier. "Why must you be so proper, Detective?"

She heard the teasing lilt to his voice, laced with a fondness that endeared him to her even more. "Boy-shorts."

"Is that your safe word?" he asked against her hair, his chest jostling with the chuckle he couldn't suppress.

"No," she laughed with him. Then, so softly he almost missed it, she added, "But they _are_ red."

**~*~ Thanks to everyone who's left reviews! More story tomorrow ... **


	6. Chapter 6

**~*~ Just a short one this morning - a longer post later today! ~*~**

Kate pounded her pillow in a fit of childish pique and let out a frustrated moan that bounced peevishly around the walls of her bedroom. She couldn't sleep. And it was all _his_ fault. She glanced at the clock next to her bed. 2:00 AM.

_Ugh_.

She tossed and turned for a few more minutes before conceding the battle, flinging her rumpled bed sheets to the side as she crawled out of bed. Padding groggily into the kitchen, she flicked on her stereo for background noise and made herself a pot of coffee through a fog of fatigue.

The small white card on her fridge caught her eye, and she fingered the well-read paper while the coffee percolated.

_Kate – Don't ever do that to me again. ~Always, Castle_

It had come with the flower arrangement he brought to the hospital the first day she was awake – the day she had, for all intents and purposes, sent him packing. She hadn't seen the card until later. It was the only florist card she kept from the garden her room became before she was discharged.

"Oh, Mom," she whispered into the night. "What am I supposed to do?"

Her heart twisted as she remembered how he'd walked her to her car that evening, his hand lingering at the small of her back as though he couldn't bear to break their connection just yet.

"_You sure you're okay to drive home?" he asked, his eyes sweeping her face in concern. _

"_Considering you were my drink Nazi tonight and kept me from having more than one drink, I'm pretty sure I'll be fine." She grinned at him and leaned against the door of her car, his hand sliding to her waist as she shifted positions. Her fingers toyed absently with the buttons of his shirt. "But thanks," she acknowledged with a dip of her head. "I could have easily drowned in there if left to myself."_

_His hand caught hers in a gentle embrace, his gaze piercing, his heart beating steadily beneath her palm. "You'll never be left to yourself if I can help it," he promised softly, and Kate nearly came unglued with the emotions she'd been trying to bury. _

_He stepped closer, and panic seized her. Tugging her hand from his grip, she shook her head mutely. "Castle," she pleaded. "I can't …" _

_The look on his face was heartbreaking, and she bit her lip against a wave of emotion. Raising his hands in surrender, he took two steps backward and smiled sadly. "Sleep tight, Detective."_

Swiping the back of her hand across her eyes, Kate tried unsuccessfully to rid her face of the tears currently streaming down her cheeks. She needed him right now, a curse flying from her lips with the admission. She grabbed her phone, and her thumb hovered over the digit that would speed dial the voice she had come to love so deeply. He'd be there for her – no questions asked – the last 3 years had taught her that much.

But then what? What did she need from him exactly?

"Everything," she murmured. Placing the cell phone back on the counter, she held a steaming mug of coffee between her hands and let its soothing heat wash over her. She couldn't call Rick – not tonight, not after the way she'd left things at the bar. She'd been figuring things out on her own just fine before he entered the picture; she wagered she could muddle through this dilemma without him too.

_And if you believe that, I've got some lake-front property in the Sahara to sell you_, the voice within her taunted.

"Shut up," Kate demanded aloud. She paused at her mother's picture and trailed her fingers over the frame.

"I wish you were here to tell me what to do, Mom. I really don't want to mess this up."

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	7. Chapter 7

It took him more than a few seconds to pull himself from dreams of sandals and boots and the color red and Kate to realize that someone was pounding on the door.

It took him a few seconds longer to untangle himself from the sheets that apparently were trying to double as restraints.

He glanced at the clock on the bedside table. 3:00 am. This couldn't be good.

Not bothering to take the additional time to grab his robe, he raced from his room in his boxers and unlatched the front door. It swung open to reveal an empty hallway. Blinking against the unexpected void, he frowned for a half-beat before sticking his head around the corner.

"Kate."

The retreating form paused, her back tense with indecision. Finally, she turned, and his heart sank at the tears flowing freely down her cheeks.

"What happened?" he demanded, his voice gravelly with sleep and dread. Was it Ryan? Esposito? Had something happened to Kate herself?

Her body shuddered under the force of her thoughts, and the lump in her throat made speaking difficult. "It's not enough," she managed to whisper tightly. "It's not enough."

He opened his arms, and she hesitated only a moment before stepping into his embrace with a sob. "Your mother's case?" he questioned, stroking her hair and back as he tried to figure out what had upset her.

"No," she sniffled. "Yes."

Chuckling groggily, Rick drew Kate into his loft without breaking his tender hold on her. He shuffled toward the sofa in a sort-of backwards line dance before guiding her gently to a seat. Keeping his arm around her shoulders, he slid a finger across her cheek to summon her gaze.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

She bit her lip, maintaining her silence, searching his eyes through wet-rimmed lashes for what seemed to him an eternity. Shifting her attention to an imaginary piece of lint on her yoga pants, she finally spoke so softly that he almost missed it. "I'm tired, Rick."

"Dad?"

The soft voice carried down the stairs, and he looked up to see Alexis' worried face peering back at him.

"It's okay, sweetie," he assured her, his fingers tracing a meaningless pattern on Kate's shoulders to ease the tension that had suddenly seized her. "Detective Beckett just needs some advice."

_Please don't bolt_, he prayed inwardly, his voice telling his daughter she could go back to bed, his eyes never leaving Kate's face.

"So…" he murmured. "You got up in the middle of the night and came all the way over here … to tell me that you're tired?"

"I couldn't sleep."

"But you're tired."

"Yes." She shot him a slight grin and shook her head. "I'm not making any sense, am I?"

He winced. "Not really, no." Hesitating, he added quietly, "But take your time. I'm here."

Her grin melted into a fond smile, and she found her hand operating of its own accord – lifting to rest against the stubble of his jaw in a gentle caress. His breath grew ragged as something shifted in her gaze. Willing himself not to move a muscle, not wanting to spook her when they seemed to be on the verge of something crucially important, he waited.

"I'm tired of this." She gestured between them. "_This_ isn't enough," she whispered, her voice breaking as tears spilled from her eyes.

"This - ?"

"It's not enough to go back to the way we were before... that day." Her words silenced his barely-begun question. "It's not enough to pretend that you didn't try to take a bullet for me. It's not enough to live like I didn't almost die, like your hands weren't covered in my blood." She stopped to cough against the sobs that wracked her slim frame. "It's not enough, Castle."

Standing, Kate began to pace, her trembling hands playing with the sleeves of her sweatshirt, then raking through her hair, then back to the sleeves. Through it all, she kept talking. Kept going down the list of "not enoughs" that she'd thought up on the way to his loft. She was rambling, and she knew it.

Rick's mind raced as he struggled to follow her words and their implications. Something was bugging him about her words, but he couldn't put his finger on it.

"It's not enough to act like you didn't say you love me," she was saying.

_Whoa. Wait a minute. There it is._

He held up his hand, catching her elbow at her next pass into his range of motion. "Hang on, Kate." She looked at him helplessly, and he fought for the ability to speak around the heart that had leapt into his throat. "Back up. What did you just say?"

She knelt in front of him, her green eyes fixed on his swiftly-paling face. "I lied, Castle."

"You – "

"I remember being shot. I remember you holding me. I remember… everything."

"Since when?" he choked out.

"Since always," Kate admitted quietly. "I never had amnesia."

He slumped against the cushions, his eyes closed against the pain of her betrayal. His head spun as understanding dawned. "So … the reason you didn't call me for three months …"

"I couldn't face it, Castle. I couldn't deal with it. Not then."

"And now?" He opened his eyes and couldn't look away if he tried.

"I _have_ to." Her hands absently came to rest on his knees even as he lifted his right hand to tuck some hair behind her ears.

"Rick …" she swallowed against a renegade sob, his fingers feathering across her jaw in reassurance. "You're my best friend. You're the first person I've let get this close to me since … since my mother died." She hiccupped around another sob and pressed the back of one hand to her lips to stop the quivering. She needed to get this out before she completely lost her nerve. "I don't want the wall to be there anymore."

"But it is," he supplied for her. Kate nodded against a new flood of tears, and he gathered her to him in a tender embrace. True, she hadn't returned his feelings – at least not yet – but for the first time in ages, he felt like hope might actually win out over despair.

Kissing the top of her head, he inhaled the scent of cherries mixed with the lingering aroma of the fall weather and tightened his hold on her. "Then we start taking it down."

His low voice sent shivers down her spine, and she knew there wasn't much about him that she could resist in that moment. She pulled away just enough to search his face for answers. "How?"

Smiling now, he finally showed a resemblance to the man-child Castle from months gone by. The lines of strain that she'd feared were a permanent addition to his forehead had begun to relax. Her own smile tugged at her lips, her breath catching as he made a slow descent, his eyes locked on a single target.

"One." His lips touched hers on a sigh, then retreated.

"Brick." Another whisper of a kiss. Another retreat.

"At." This time, she snaked a hand behind his neck to hold his head in place for just a moment longer, wondering why she had kept herself from this so resolutely.

"A." He kissed her, and she smiled because she could feel his grin against her lips.

"Time." Another soft caress of her mouth was followed by his forehead resting against hers with a ragged sigh.

"One brick at a time," he repeated, and she thought to herself that his voice had never sounded sexier.

"Say it again… now that I'm not dying."

"I love you, Kate," he obliged, knowing instinctively what she meant, his lips forming the words against her skin. Pulling back to look into her eyes, he said it again because he could. "I love you."

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	8. Chapter 8

Castle kissed the top of her head again, relishing in the freedom to do so. His hand stroked lightly up and down her arm, his bare chest tingling with the puffs of air that came in soft snores from the woman in his lap. A smile tinged his lips as the memories of last night invaded his thoughts yet again.

They had talked. They had cuddled in silence. They had stolen a few soft kisses. Kisses that weren't nearly as lingering or passionate as Rick would have liked, but he'd promised to chip away at the wall one brick at a time – not knock the whole thing down with a demolition crew. Although, the idea _did_ have merit…

At some point, they had run out of words. Both too exhausted to communicate anything else – verbally or otherwise – he'd gathered her into his arms, holding her on his lap the way he'd held Alexis when she was a child and afraid. He'd dozed; Kate was nearly comatose. Waking after only a couple of hours, he was content to simply hold her, absorbing her scent, drinking in her beauty.

"Is Kate okay, Dad?"

Alexis' quiet question startled him, and he glanced across the room to where his daughter now stood.

He nodded. "We just had some things to… sort out."

His low response drew a murmured sigh of protest from Kate, and his breath stuttered as she snuggled closer against him.

"And did you?" Alexis cocked one eyebrow sarcastically.

"Let's just say that we're on the right track."

Clearly, something had changed between the two partners last night, Alexis observed to herself. It must have – in order for Kate to let Rick hold her like that, on the couch in his loft, him wearing only…

"Ew, Dad!" his daughter protested as only a young adult can. "Gross. Go put on some clothes."

She hurried from the room before he could respond, but her loud whisper of an outburst had coaxed Kate from the deep sleep that had engulfed her. Rick held his breath as she stirred, a bit fearful of how she would react to things in the light of day. He needn't have worried.

"Hi," Kate greeted sleepily, a look of utter contentment painted across her features. He smiled at her, not bothering to hide his feelings for the first time in maybe forever, and caressed her face tenderly before smoothing her tousled hair. Leaning closer, he waited to gauge her response, and when her hand stole around his neck, he closed the gap between them.

"Richard," his mother's voice carried from the kitchen, suddenly crashing into their euphoria. Kate jolted and scrambled to leap from his lap, but his hand at her back held her in place. Her eyes pleaded with him to release her; he shook his head.

"I'm not letting you run from this anymore," he whispered, softening his words with a light peck on the tip of her nose.

His mother was still speaking, and her voice was getting closer. "Alexis came barreling into the kitchen, going on about how we needed to call a furniture sanitizer. Do you have any idea what she's – Oh!"

Martha stopped dead in her tracks at the sight that greeted her. "Uh… Kate! Hello!"

"Mother," Rick spoke, his eyes locked on Kate's. "Could you give us a couple of minutes?"

"Yes, yes, of course," Martha answered hurriedly. Backing out of the room, she added, "Richard, dear, _do_ put some clothes on. It's just not sanitary."

A soft chuckle started in Kate's chest and tumbled past her lips, drawing Rick in to the humor of the moment in relief. She stole his laughter when she traced the muscles of his chest with a tentative hand, and she smiled as his breath caught.

"I think your … _undergarments_ … are cute," she told him, giggling softly as he blushed.

"Well … red sandals, they're not."

She laughed again, and he decided it was one of his favorite sounds.

Running her fingers down his chest, she toyed with the waistband of his Superman boxers, enjoying the thrill of the soft grunt that escaped him – almost as though she had punched him. She finally took pity on his ragged breathing and flicked him playfully in the abdomen instead of continuing the sweet torture she had been perpetrating. When she met his eyes, he was pleased to see life twinkling in the green pools once again.

"You have no idea how … _free_ … I feel today," Kate confessed in a quiet voice, and he didn't miss the slight tremor that coated the words. "Just getting all of that off my chest last night … Thank you."

He couldn't resist the opportunity she had just handed him. "You're welcome. And, you know, if you ever want to get anything else off your chest," his gaze raked flirtatiously over her sweatshirt, "I'm here for you."

She smacked him before he could react and slid off his lap with an, "Ugh, Castle. Is your mind ever _not_ in the gutter?" The smile at her lips and the fondness in her voice softened the reproach, and he allowed her escape, taking it for what it was.

Straightening her rumpled clothes, she ran her hands through her hair and grimaced. "I'm a mess."

"You're beautiful," he corrected.

"I should go home and change." However, she made no effort to move for her purse and keys.

"Or…" he drawled, his voice suddenly raspy as he reached out to fold her hand into one of his. Tugging her gently, he brushed his lips across her forehead and nuzzled her hair. "You could stay and eat breakfast… and then maybe lunch … and after that you might as well stay for dinner."

He made a mental note to thank God for Saturdays. And Kate. And Saturdays _with_ Kate.

"Or," Kate was countering when he refocused on the current moment, her chin tilted so she could look at him while she spoke. "You can let me go home and freshen up and then I'll come back for the rest of the day." She silenced his protest with a finger to his lips.

Sliding her hands around his waist, she volunteered a slow, lingering kiss before pulling back just far enough to add, "I'm not running away, I promise. No more running."

He released her after stealing another kiss – for good measure, he told her. "Hey Kate," he called just as she reached the door. When she glanced over her shoulder at him, he instructed, "Bring an overnight bag. Just in case I want to hold you all night again, I don't want you running out of here in the morning."

She smiled, so widely that Rick feared it would stretch her face out of shape. A shy blush crept across her cheeks as she nodded. She opened the door to leave, paused, and turned to face him once more. "I like the bricks we've chipped away so far, Castle."

"Me too, Kate. Me too."

That was the understatement of the century.


	9. Chapter 9

***~*~* I'm so glad y'all are enjoying this so far! Thank you for all of your comments - you're too sweet!**

The air was crisp, the sky a cloudless bright blue. Kate and Rick walked hand-in-hand through the street carnival – although he'd had to utilize all the charm at his disposal to get her to allow that much physical contact in public. He'd finally managed to convince her that he plain and simply _wanted_ to hold her hand and, on the off chance that they ran into anyone they knew, she could tell people it was to keep him from losing her in the crowd.

"_Yeah, because I'm the detective and you're the writer," she rolled her eyes in good humor, still warring with the decision. Something so simple, and yet to Kate it seemed like something life-changing. She knew it was ridiculous; she couldn't help it._

"_Okay," he relented. "Then, it's so __**you**__ won't lose __**me**_. _Is that better?" _

_She winced at the slight tinge of frustration she heard in his voice. "I'm sorry." Holding out her hand, she fought the urge to tense up when he claimed it in his. "I'm trying," she finished with a weak smile. _

"_I know." He squeezed her hand agreeably and tugged her just close enough that their shoulders occasionally brushed each other as they walked. "Besides," he added with a boyish grin, "You're always saying that I'm like a little kid. This will keep up appearances." _

"Oooh! Castle – caramel apples!" Kate broke into his reminiscing with an almost girlish excitement. "Can we get one?"

He glanced at her in amusement, enjoying this side of Kate that he always knew was in there somewhere. A sense of pride swelled in his chest at the knowledge that he'd been the one to really bring it out in her. Well, okay, so maybe he should share the credit with a caramel apple, but still…

Paying for the largest apple at the vendor stand, he handed it to her with a flourish and chuckled as she dove in eagerly. She surprised him when she offered him a bite, and he couldn't help but inwardly wish that she'd let him have a taste of her mouth instead.

"Yes, that would be more fun," she startled him further by chiding. "But I'm afraid you'll just have to settle for your own bite of the apple."

"How – ?"

She smirked and took another bite, stopping for a moment to lick at the apple juices that were dribbling down the caramel coating. Noting the way his eyes darkened hungrily, she shook her head fondly. "Castle, you are many things… but subtle you are not. I can tell what you're thinking by just looking at you."

Stopping their progress down the sidewalk, he leaned down and murmured, "Can you tell what I'm thinking now?"

Her face flushed an adorable shade of red in confirmation, and he took advantage of her unsettled state to steal a bite of the caramel apple while she held it, holding her gaze as he moved. He had to reach up and fold his fingers around hers to hold it steady when her grip slackened, and he noted with pleasure that her breathing had shallowed.

Tweaking her nose gently, he laughed when she predictably swatted him in the arm. He placed her hand in the crook of his elbow and began moving them further through the carnival. They paused to watch a puppet show fairy tale, and Rick felt his heart rate increase when Kate casually leaned into his side.

"I bet you did puppet shows for Alexis when she was a kid, didn't you?" she guessed, glancing up at him to see if her assumption had been correct.

"I plead the fifth."

Kate laughed. "You did, didn't you?" When he merely pursed his lips noncommittally, she poked him in the side with a teasing finger. "I think it's cute." Her eyes drank in his ruggedly handsome face, and her smile melted into something more wistful. "You're a great dad, Rick."

He turned toward her, a little startled at the warmth in her voice. "Thanks, Kate. That means … everything to me."

Something in the distance over Kate's shoulder caught his attention, and his face lit up like a Christmas tree. Grabbing her hand, he tossed the rest of the apple in the trash and dragged her toward the grassy knoll of the nearby park.

"I wasn't finished with that," she protested. "Castle!"

"I'll buy you another one," he promised. "One hundred of them, if you want."

Reaching their destination, he grinned unabashedly at her, and she groaned. That look of childish delight on his face could only mean one thing …

"Piggyback races!"

Kate followed his pointing finger until her gaze landed on the crowd of observers and participants that had gathered at the starting line. "No. Oh, no, no, no, Castle," she argued with a vehement shake of her head. "Absolutely not."

"C'mon Kate," he cajoled. "There's still time to sign up." When she hesitated, he swung their enclosed hands together at his side and whined, "It will be fun!"

He saw in her face the moment she gave in. "Hop on," he directed, hitching a thumb in the direction of his back, and soon was gifted with the unbelievable feeling of Kate's arms around his neck, her body plastered to his back, her knees crooked at his waist.

"Alright, writer boy, giddyup," she commanded, her voice tickling his ear. "But this had better be worth it. I don't like to lose."

He did. It was. She didn't.

***~*Reviews make me happy. Happy makes me write fuzzies. You can connect the dots ;)**


	10. Chapter 10

"Can I ask you something?"

Rick's soft question made Kate lift her head from its position against his chest. They were spending the last few hours of Saturday on the couch in his loft, absently watching TV while they relished the newness of just being together this way. Alexis had gone out with friends, Martha to a rehearsal, leaving the two of them alone.

"Sure, Rick. Of course."

He drifted his fingers idly up and down her arm. "You may not like it," he warned, dread pooling in his stomach as she broke eye contact. An inaudible sigh of relief squeezed his lungs when she snuggled back against his chest instead of moving away as he'd feared she would.

Neither spoke for a period of seconds; one waited quietly, one debated inwardly.

"Can I reserve the right not to answer?" she finally countered.

He tightened his arm that was around her, pulling her closer into his side and resting his chin on the top of her head. "You don't have to answer _me_," he assured her.

A soft kiss to her hair preceded his next request. "But… it's really important to me that _you_ know the answer yourself."

She didn't respond right away, and he could feel the tension rippling across her shoulders as she weighed her next words. Nuzzling her hair, he gave her all the time she needed, thankful beyond measure that she wasn't shutting him out completely.

"Okay."

He almost missed her reply when it finally came, but when the word registered with him he squeezed her arm in acknowledgment.

"You told me that you can't be in the kind of relationship you want until your mother's case is solved. That you're … on one side of a wall, so to speak." He kept his voice low and quiet, his fingers again caressing her skin as he talked. "But … why do I have to be on the other side, Kate?"

She glanced up at him, her brow wrinkled in confusion. "I don't understand."

"I know as much about your mother's case as you do. I'm just as invested in it as you are. I know how important it is to you, and it hasn't driven me away yet." When the furrows in her brow deepened, he hastened to explain further. "I've been there – with you – for every break in your mother's case so far. Why does that wall have to affect _us_?"

When she remained silent and shifted her face so he could no longer read her expression, he fought against a rising swell of panic. "Don't get me wrong," he continued and tried to keep the desperation from his voice. "I understand the wall. I get it. I just don't see why it's there with _me_."

He felt the trembling breath that filled her lungs even as he held his. "Because I'm afraid to love you when I don't know what will happen to me – to you," Kate finally whispered, her voice tight with emotion.

"Oh honey," he murmured, his hands applying gentle pressure to her upper arms, encouraging her to turn and face him. "C'mere."

He was unprepared when she obliged by straddling him, her knees hugging his hips, her hands clasping behind his neck. Her eyes pleaded with him to understand what she wasn't saying, and he forced his suddenly incoherent brain to obey.

_Sweet mercy. She was going to kill him. _

A smile quirked at his lips as another thought slid into home.

_But what a way to go…_

He winced. That was cheesy, even for him.

"Castle."

Jolting back to awareness, he grimaced sheepishly. "Sorry – my mind was …" He cleared his throat. "Elsewhere."

"I thought we were having a serious discussion." She was smiling tolerantly though and began to stroke the hair at the nape of his neck with an almost mindless caress.

"We were," he agreed, adding his own boyish grin to the mix. "Until a certain minx that I'm _extraordinarily_ attracted to decided to drive all thoughts but one from my limited brain capacity."

Unable to resist the tempting skin of her neck, Castle dragged his lips across her throat, delighting in the pleased vibrations beneath his kiss. Continuing his exploration, he nipped teasingly at her ear lobe and flexed his hands at her hips in reaction to the gasp that escaped his muse.

"Castle," she managed to chide – albeit breathlessly. "What are you doing?"

"Turnabout. Fair play. Etc. Etc." His words were punctuated by the delicious things he was currently doing to her ear lobe with his tongue and teeth.

She could tell the effect that her soft moans were having on Castle, given her position on his lap, and she was unable to stop herself from settling more intimately against him. With a ragged groan, he buried his face in her shoulder and tried to rein in the desire that coursed through his body. Just an innocent – well, okay, not so innocent – exploration of her neck and ears, and a raging fire threatened to consume him.

"Kate," he breathed, "For the love of my personal sanity, can we please talk about that damned wall?"

"I was trying to," she protested weakly, knowing as well as he did that she had welcomed the delay.

He wisely held his tongue – both from arguing with her and from tasting the skin behind her ear lobe again. Tucking her mussed (thanks to him) hair behind her ears, he sighed and stole a quick kiss. "I'm becoming very addicted to this, you know. Kissing you. Holding you."

She smiled and traced the features of the face she knew so well – the face she dreamed about, the face she trusted, the face she _loved_. "The wall isn't really a wall with you, Rick. It's really more of a…baby-gate."

Pouting goodnaturedly, he whined, "Are you saying I'm a toddler?"

A finely-shaped eyebrow arched in reply. "If the shoe fits, Castle…" Her teasing retort was cut off by a yelped laugh of surprise when he swiveled them both to a reclining position on the couch – him on top, staring down at her twinkling eyes with a knowing smirk.

"I assure you, Detective Beckett," he began, shifting until his lower body rested gently over hers. "I am _very much_ a man."


	11. Chapter 11

Desire glazed her eyes, and he was drawn to her lips by some irresistible force. For as much as the kisses they'd shared so far this weekend had been tender and full of love, this kiss was fiery with all the passion they'd been suppressing for years.

Her legs hooked over his, pinning him to her – like he would be going anywhere. Castle was pretty sure even a home invasion wouldn't be enough to draw him from her arms right then.

_Take anything you want – just leave the couch._

His hands were everywhere, alternately soothing and stoking, tangling in her hair and coaxing her even deeper into the abyss of need. She felt the muscles bunching in his back as her hands feverishly traveled up and down his spine.

"Rick," she panted when he abandoned her lips to deposit frenzied kisses along the line of her t-shirt's V-neck collar. Her fingers raked through his hair, air hissing through her teeth as her body struggled to remember why this wasn't a good idea right now.

"I know," he groaned in understanding, resting his forehead against the swells of her chest, finding pleasure in the erratic heartbeat pulsing beneath him. Flopping to his side, he lay with his back against the couch, his body stretched out the length of hers with an arm over her stomach to tuck her into his now-gentle embrace. They stayed silent for a few minutes, both trying to steady their breathing and cool their sensitized skin.

Kate was the first to speak. "We've been in a relationship for 3 years, haven't we?"

He chuckled and nodded against her hair. "A very confusing relationship. But yes. Especially this last year."

"The confusing part or the relationship part?"

"Both."

Giving a small smile in agreement, she sighed. He couldn't tell if it was a sigh of contentment or frustration, so he lifted his face to watch her carefully. When she offered an explanation, he began to understand. "You could have gotten killed pushing me out of the way of that bullet at the cemetery."

"_You_ almost died," he countered, his hold on her tightening as the nightmares that still haunted him replayed in his mind's eye. She moved her hand to cover his larger one that lay against her abdomen and met his gaze.

"That's my point, Rick. Just because we've tabled the investigation for now, that doesn't mean that whoever wants me dead won't try again. And what if you're there again when they do try? What if they kill you instead? I … I couldn't handle it."

"What if they'd tried before yesterday? What if I _had_ been killed before we talked about our relationship?" He watched as the significance of his rebuttal flickered across her face. "Would you have been able to handle it any better?"

"No," she whispered as realization dawned. "Worse. I'd have handled it worse because… I didn't get to tell you how I feel about you." She rose up on her elbows and faced him with concern. "I love you. You know that, right?"

He kissed her long and hard, releasing her body so he was free to cup the back of her head. "I hoped," he confessed when he could speak again, his voice trembling more than he would have liked. "I wasn't sure _you _knew that you did."

"I've known since that whole, terrible Gina-Tom-Hamptons fiasco," she told him, her nose crinkling in distaste at the memory. He kissed it back into shape and made a slight detour toward her lips because he couldn't resist.

"Kate… keeping me on one side of the wall while you're on the other isn't going to stop the possibility that one of us will get hurt." Winding some hair gently around one of his fingers, he continued, "And it's not going to make it any less difficult if the worst should happen."

When she stayed silent, he dared to go a step further. "I told you I would help you take the wall apart one brick at a time. I'll keep that promise, if that's what you want. But… I'd be lying if I said I was satisfied with that."

"I'm scared, Rick," she finally admitted. "I've never had this much to lose before."

He held her close, soothing her with his nearness and the reassuring whispers against her skin. "Me either – other than Alexis. But definitely not in any other relationship. This is different, Kate. For both of us. There's a lot at stake."

He brushed a kiss to her cheek and stroked her hair with a light touch. When she looked up at him, he spoke once more, "I've also never had this much to _gain._"

"How do you always know the right thing to say?"

The incredulous look on his face made her laugh. "Clearly, your brain has been fogged by my kisses and you've forgotten a lot of the past three years," he teased her. "Of course, I _could_ use that to my advantage."

"I would expect nothing less, Castle," Kate parried in return. She stopped his descent with a hand against his chest. "The wall… It's still there. I'm open to destroying whole sections of it at a time, but I can't promise that I won't try to rebuild some of it from time to time. If I do… when I do … I want you not to – no, I _need_ you not to let me. I'm tired of pushing you away. I want to do this right."

His eyes brightened at her admission, his head lowering toward her lips as her hand eased around his neck. When they surfaced for air a long while later, Castle felt completely twitter pated, to quote a certain Disney bunny rabbit. One look at Kate told him he wasn't alone.

"What's my name?" she murmured breathlessly, her lips millimeters away from his. "I'm having trouble remembering it right now."

"Kate," he managed to croak. "You're Kate."

She nodded. "And you're Rick."

It was his turn to nod. "Now that we've got the introductions out of the way," he applied the slightest pressure to the back of her head and her lips met his yet again.

After that, coherent thought wasn't really necessary – which was a good thing, because it was nowhere to be found.

***~*~*~*~*~* Thanks so much for all the reviews, alerts, and favorites so far. I've written for another show before, but this is my first Castle fanfic and you all are making this such a wonderful experience! And now I have to go write some more because I've written through my cushion :-) . Reviews may make me write faster (hint, hint!).**


	12. Chapter 12

Kate pulled up in front of the precinct and sat for a moment, her car idling as though waiting for her to chicken out and drive back home. She had pulled herself out of Castle's arms Saturday night and returned to her apartment; she'd known that if she stayed they would have ended up in bed – and not to sleep. Once they crossed that bridge, they couldn't uncross it. And as much as she wanted to – as much as she _needed_ him – she just wasn't sure she was ready for everything it would set into motion.

They had talked via phone and text several times yesterday, but she'd remained firm in her resolve to spend the day otherwise alone. She had been given a lot to think about this weekend, and she owed it to Rick to give those thoughts her full attention – something she couldn't do when he was physically nearby, being physically distracting.

A knock on her window startled her into awareness.

_Speaking of nearby and distracting … _

It really was unfair for him to look this good on a Monday morning. His black sweater highlighted all the right places, his jeans adding to the casual and comfortable vibe he was exuding. She felt her heart swell with love and blinked against a sudden rush of moisture in the corner of her eyes. _She, Kate Beckett, loved him, Richard Castle. _The thought in turn both amazed and scared the heck out of her.

He dangled a cup of coffee temptingly in front of her window, and she laughed softly at the pleading contortions of his face.

"I haven't seen you in a whole day," Rick complained in a low, sexy growl – for her ears only – when she finally turned off her ignition and climbed out of her vehicle.

Taking the coffee he held out to her, she tossed him an understanding quirk of a smile and briskly walked toward the precinct's entrance. He held the door open for her, and as she breezed by him, she murmured, "Remember what we agreed."

Kate heard his predictable grumble of acknowledgment and hid her grin behind a sip of coffee while she waited for the elevator. Feeling the warmth of his presence behind her, she literally had to force herself _not_ to lean into him. They had decided not to let anyone outside of Castle's family know about their new relationship status for now – more Kate's decision than Rick's, and she was already second-guessing her supposed wisdom.

_Oh, but it would be so much easier to not hide._ The thought nudged her mind as she stepped into the elevator and pushed the button for their floor, Castle close behind. Very close.

As soon the doors shut them off to the rest of the world, his arms circled her waist and pulled her gently against him, her back to his chest. Rick leaned around her and kissed her ear, then her cheek, nuzzling her skin with his nose before migrating to her temple where he let his lips linger a bit longer.

"Rick," she chided half-heartedly, her free hand covering one of his that rested just above her belt.

"I'm sorry. I couldn't resist," he grinned against her hair. "You are so. Incredibly. Addicting."

A glance at the glowing numbers above them told Kate that their brief interlude of privacy was almost over. "I love you," she whispered as she regretfully extricated herself from his grasp. As the elevator dinged to a halt and the doors slid open, she glanced back at him. "Don't forget that today, okay?"

She was gone before he could react, her heels clicking and clacking with purpose toward her desk. He hurried after her, admiring the view, and winked discreetly when he caught up to her. "Same goes for you," he parried. "On both counts."

A pleased blush briefly dusted her cheeks before she gathered her bearings again, piling her things on her desk and glancing around to see what had transpired over the weekend. Noting the sudden flurry of suspicious rustling where Ryan and Esposito sat, her eyes narrowed, her attention drawn to them in curiosity.

"What do you suppose they're up to?" she asked Castle, cocking her head in the other duo's direction.

He turned to see what she meant, a sense of dread threatening to overpower the euphoria of being with Kate after a long Sunday without her. "I don't know," he murmured.

The two detectives currently under observation were trying to avoid making eye contact with Kate and Rick at all costs, and Kate noticed them passing something back and forth very secretively. Before she had time to investigate it further, Gates appeared in her office doorway and called out to her.

"Detective Beckett, a moment, please." The words were given as a command, not a request, and Kate exchanged a glance with Castle before hurrying to do as instructed.

As soon as she had disappeared from view, Rick got up and strode toward Ryan and Esposito, his jaw set with purpose. "Alright, boys," he placed his hands on Esposito's desk and leaned in. "What's going on?"

"Have a good weekend?" Ryan asked with a cheeky tone to his voice that raised Castle's suspicions even further.

"I did," he answered with some hesitation. "You?"

"Go anywhere?" Esposito continued before Ryan could answer.

"With anyone?" Ryan added, sealing the fear that had started to tighten in Rick's chest.

_What do they know? And how do they know it?_

Spying something sticking out from beneath Ryan's keyboard, and noting the way that the men's eyes kept migrating toward it, Castle lunged and managed to snatch it away before either detective could react enough to prevent its capture. His own face stared back at him from the newspaper he now held – his own face leaning in to snag a bite of the caramel apple Kate was offering to him. _Kate_! She was well and truly going to kill him.

He cursed and sat down heavily on the edge of Ryan's desk, his eyes scanning the brief article in irritation. _**Muse or Mistress?**_ The headline taunted him as the reporter went on to speculate about the apparent date between the famous mystery writer and the detective who inspired him. And, as if the caramel apple picture were not enough to seal his impending murder at Kate's hands, a second (and perhaps more incriminating) photo taken during the piggyback races was also printed there in black and white for all of New York to see.

_How did I miss this?_ He wracked his brain for any memory of a photographer hovering during the street fair, but all he saw in his mind's eye was Kate. Which probably explained the lapse in paparazzi-detection on his part.

"Castle! We've got a body," Kate called to him as she exited Gates' office. She headed toward her desk until she realized he wasn't following, and she turned to face him in slight exasperation. "Are you coming?"

When he continued to stare at her mutely, the newspaper clutched in his hands, she changed direction and reached him in a matter of a few steps. "What's going on?"

Taking the paper, she quickly answered her own question with a curse and an accusing glare at, first Castle, then Ryan and Esposito.

"What is this?"

"Uh…" Castle nearly stumbled over himself in an attempt to come up with a plausible explanation that wouldn't undo the secrecy they were trying to maintain. "I was just getting ready to tell the boys here about the date I had this weekend with that girl I've been telling you about." When her eyebrow arched, he continued weakly, "You know, the one that looks a lot like you."

The incredulous look on Kate's face said, _Is that the best you could come up with?_

One glance toward Ryan and Esposito, and Rick could tell they weren't buying it either. He felt the helplessness paint itself across his features, and he met Kate's glare with a sheepish shrug. She closed her eyes and shook her head in resignation, pivoting on her heels and heading for the elevator.

"C'mon Castle. Body. Queens. Let's go."

"Hey, Castle!" Esposito called out after him. "If Beckett won't let you drive, you could always go piggyback to the crime scene."

Ryan was not about to be left out. "Yeah, could you pick me up a caramel apple on your way back? I'll even let you have a bite."

The two detectives dissolved in laughter as Castle tried to ignore them, swiping his jacket from his chair as he made his way to where Kate was impatiently holding the elevator for him.

"How in trouble am I?" he asked timidly, taking with trepidation the cell phone she wordlessly handed him.

_Girl, did you win the race?_

He winced at Lanie's text and sighed, giving Kate back her phone, apology oozing from every pore of his face. "Kate … I –"

The elevator reached the ground floor, and she brushed past him, moving quickly toward her car. He followed, mind racing as he tried to gauge how much of the wall would be rebuilt because of his carelessness.

"For the record," Kate said nonchalantly as she expertly maneuvered into the congested traffic. "I _will_ get back at you for this – when you don't expect it. Be afraid."

"Is that a promise?" He couldn't resist the retort. The traces of the smile tugging at her lips gave her away, and Castle reached out to run a seductive finger down her arm, thrilling at the shiver that she was unable to hide.

When she tried to act like she was unaffected, he chuckled. "I'm going to like being your man, KB." He turned to look out the window with a contented grin and changed the subject to grant Kate a brief reprieve from this new territory.

"So… tell me about the body."


	13. Chapter 13

***~*~*~* You guys are the best! Thank you so much for all the reviews, favorites, and alerts you've sent my way so far - I'm very grateful. :) **

"You know – all is not lost," Rick assured Kate as he held the crime scene tape for her to duck beneath.

"What are you talking about?" She stuck her hand in her pocket, pulled out a pair of gloves, and stretched them over her fingers until they snapped into place at her wrist.

"The pictures. In the paper," he explained, realizing she hadn't been privy to his train of thought. He hurried to keep up with her as she made her way to the cluster of officers who were gathered around the apparent victim.

"Ah – you mean the ones of you and my identical twin?" Kate retorted glibly, a small smirk twisting her mouth.

"Yeah – okay, that was pretty lame." He trailed after her while she paced the perimeter of the body, lowering his voice to a whisper to add, "But I think we can redeem this … situation."

"I'm listening." She glanced to him in expectation even as she squatted next to the figure lying prone on the ground.

He hastened to join her, leaning close to murmur in a voice too low to be heard by anyone besides Kate. "We say it was for publicity."

"That has possibilities," she acknowledged as though he were offering a theory as to cause of death. "We'll discuss it later."

She stood to her feet, briefly bracing herself with a hand to his shoulder. When she let her fingers linger a split second longer than normal, he smiled, covering the grin with a well-timed cough. Glancing up, he met Lanie's knowing gaze from across the room.

_Yeah, we aren't fooling anyone._

* * *

><p>"Alright, girl. You have about two seconds to tell me what is going on between you and writer-boy." Lanie leaned against one of the metal gurneys in the morgue and crossed her arms across her chest. "I'm a doctor. I know how to torture."<p>

Kate laughed at her friend but didn't answer right away, choosing instead to find great interest in the autopsy report she held in her hands. When Lanie's eyes began to bore a hole in her back, Kate turned around with what she hoped was a confused expression on her face.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Lanie stuck her face closer to the detective's. "Do I have something on my forehead?"

"Ummm… no," Kate replied truthfully, her own brow wrinkled in uncertainty.

"Really? Cuz from that 'I don't know what you're talking about' crap you just handed me, I was sure the word 'stupid' surely must be stamped across my face somewhere."

"Lanie –"

"Girl – don't 'Lanie' me. Between those pictures in the paper and all those electric glances you kept throwing each other at the crime scene today, I have all the evidence I need." The spunky medical examiner paused and stepped closer, placing a gentle hand on Kate's shoulder, saddened by the tension she felt there. "I just want to hear it from you."

"I –" Kate faltered. "I don't know what to say."

The hand on her shoulder squeezed reassuringly. "Kate – does he make you happy?"

Tears unexpectedly filled the detective's eyes, and she rapidly blinked them away. She hated crying.

Nodding, she managed to whisper, "Yes. He does." The truth in those words made her heart soar, and she suddenly wanted to be back in his arms.

Lanie regarded her thoughtfully for a moment, a large smile breaking across her face just before she pulled Kate into a spontaneous hug. "Then that's enough for me."

Holding Kate at arm's length, she fixed her with a stern gaze. "For now. It's enough for now. But one of these days we are _going_ to talk about this. And I will want _details_."

Startled at her choice of words, Kate could only nod for a moment. "Understood."

"Alright. Now, get out of here," Lanie teased. "Some of us have work to do." A mischievous grin tweaked her lips. "And some of us have _writers_ to do…"

She expected the swat from the file in Kate's hands; she didn't expect the carefree laugh that accompanied it as the detective left the morgue. 'Carefree' was never a word she would have used for Kate, but something had changed over the weekend – and Lanie suspected a certain Rick Castle should get the credit.

Muttering to the body in front of her, Lanie shook her head. "It's about damn time."


	14. Chapter 14

Her phone vibrated against her desk, alerting her to a new text message.

_**You. Me. Dinner tonight. 7:00?**_

Kate glanced to her left to watch Castle return to the bullpen after picking up some lunch for them to eat while they worked. Suddenly unsettled, she took her takeout container from the tower he carried and waited until he'd returned to his normal perch before speaking.

"Did you just ask me out on a date, Mr. Castle?" She shoveled a french fry past her lips and tried to act nonchalant when she really was feeling anything but.

His jacket rustled as he shrugged it from his shoulders while juggling his own lunch and what was quite possibly the largest soft drink Kate had ever seen.

"Oh – did I send that to your phone? Sorry… that was supposed to go to your twin."

She shot him a tolerantly fond glare and took a bite of her sandwich, looking around at her desk as though something were missing. "Where's my drink, Castle?"

"I thought we could share. It was cheaper this way."

"Since when have you cared about 'cheaper'?" Kate retorted, stealing the gargantuan Styrofoam cup from his hand and eyeing her coffee cup from that morning with consideration.

"Okay," he freely admitted, grinning boyishly as he stuck a whole handful of fries into his mouth and then tried to talk around them. "I really just wanted my lips to be somewhere yours had been."

"Sorry to disappoint you." She didn't try to sound apologetic though, catching the comically crestfallen look on Castle's face while she poured part of his soda into her coffee cup. Handing the large vessel back to him, she whispered, "You'll just have to wait for that until later."

Secretly loving the way he stammered a semblance of words strung together, Kate skimmed through a set of reports and hoped she appeared unaffected. "Yes," she said quietly after a moment.

"Yes – what?" he questioned around a bite of his hamburger.

"You. Me. Dinner tonight. 7:00," she parroted his text back to him.

His eyes lit up, and she let herself get lost in his delight for the briefest of smiles. "I'll pick you up," he murmured, fighting the urge to reach out and tuck some wayward hair behind her shoulders.

"What should I wear?"

He smirked flirtatiously. "Well, of course, my personal preference would be _nothing_, but they tend to frown on that in fine dining establishments here."

"Ha. Ha. Castle." Just for his smart aleck orneriness (and _not_ because her mouth was suddenly devoid of all moisture), she confiscated his soda again and topped off her share.

They ate in silence for a few moments until Castle leaned in under the guise of stealing some fries from Kate's lunch. "The kind of dresses you've worn to my book parties, movie premieres, stuff like that – those should be fine for where we're going tonight."

Swatting his hand away, she stole back a few fries and nodded to let him know she'd heard his soft words.

"Personal preferences are funny things," she began, her fingers tapping out a reply to an email at her computer, her eyes fixed to the monitor. "Sometimes, they backfire on us."

He sat up straighter. "Like how?"

Her desk phone rang just then, and Kate answered it. Speaking to the person on the other end, she glanced across the room toward the fax machine to see it begin to spit out an incoming report. "Yep, I see it coming in now," she said into the receiver. "Thanks."

When she returned to her chair, he asked again. "Like how?"

Leaning back a bit, she swiveled casually to face him. "Like… I just might decide that I don't have a thing to wear. And since you said 'nothing' was your preference anyway…" She shrugged and let her voice trail off, leaving him to fill in the blanks.

One look at his face, and she had to bite her lip to stifle a laugh. "Oh Castle, you're so easy."

She turned back to the reports on her desk and jumped slightly when his gravelly voice tickled her ear. "You have no idea."

Recalling the time that she'd been the one to say those words to him, she fondly shoved him back to his seat and didn't try too hard to hide her smile.

_I'm going to like being your girl, Castle_, she thought to herself. _Probably more than I should._


	15. Chapter 15

Kate nervously ran her hands down the front of her dress, hoping that Castle would like its deep purple tone. Maybe she should have gone with the red one instead.

Biting her lip in uncertainty, she touched the wispy tendrils at her neck and sighed. She'd pulled her hair back into a loose updo on a whim, and now she was second-guessing that decision too. Maybe she should have left it down instead.

She eyed her makeup with a critical gaze and nearly grabbed her cosmetic bag to start over again from scratch.

"What is wrong with me?" she whispered at her reflection. "It's just dinner with Castle."

Her mirror image merely watched her in disbelief. "I know, I know," Kate continued the one-sided conversation. "It occurred to you this afternoon that this might very well be your last first date… and you're petrified."

Gripping the bathroom sink with white knuckles, she laughed softly and rolled her eyes at her own behavior. "I'm talking to a mirror."

She would be kidding herself if she denied that the thought of a future with Rick had crossed her mind. It had toyed with her over the last few years, surfacing in full force since this weekend. He could very well be her 'one and done', and she had to admit to herself that he quite often had 'forever' in his eyes when he looked at her.

Especially over the past year.

Even more so the past few days.

It scared her – terrified her, to be more accurate – and exhilarated her all in the same thought.

The knock on her door released the butterflies in her stomach again, and she pressed a hand to her abdomen to settle them. Drawing a deep breath, she grabbed her black wrap and the small clutch that matched it, forcing a lightness to her step and a smile to her face as she opened the door.

"Hi," she breathed, her eyes raking his form in appreciation.

Kate needn't have worried about her dress or her hair or her makeup; the light in his eyes, the catch in his breathing, the parting of his lips all told her that he liked what he saw.

He stepped toward her with a look of awe. "Wow."

She saw the exact moment when the gleam in his gaze turned from admiring to predatory, and she backed away hesitantly, one hand out to hold him at bay. "Castle – Rick – don't we have reservations?"

Grabbing her around the waist, he hauled her mischievously against him and let his lips hover over hers, tantalizing and teasing. "If you mean 'do I have any reservations about skipping dinner and having my wicked way with you', then… no."

Laughing, she tried to twist away but he held her in place and lazily dragged his lips along the line of her jaw, stealing the air from her lungs with a gentle nip.

"I meant – oh! I meant dinner reservations," Kate groaned around his seductive ministrations and half-heartedly pushed her hands against his shoulders. Becoming distracted by the firm muscles beneath her fingers, she uttered a throaty whisper of a moan and angled her neck to allow him better access to the path his lips were traveling.

"Reservations." He butterflied a kiss to the pulse beating erratically near her collar bone.

"Are only." His lips to her earlobe sent her clutch and wrap slithering to a puddle from her numb fingers.

"For people who – mmm." The trembling hands at her back had discovered the wide expanse of skin bared to his touch by the design of the dress. She shivered as bolts of awareness shot through her body with each caress of his fingers along her spine.

"People who what?" Kate asked breathlessly, wondering at her ability to form any words at all as Rick pinned her to the wall with a gentle pressure of his body against hers.

"Mmmm…" He continued nibbling a path from her collarbone to her earlobe with slight detours to explore her jaw. "Who aren't rich or famous enough to bribe the maitre-d," he finished between kisses.

"Kate –" His lips found their home on hers with a satisfied groan before he pulled away to pant, "Limo. Downstairs. Waiting."

"I'm – not – stopping – you," she argued around her need for air.

Rick drew slightly away, his eyes glazed with desire as he grinned rakishly at her. "The hell you aren't."

She glanced around in surprise. Where her back had once been against the wall, his now was. The lapels of his sports coat were bunched in her fists, and one silken knee was crooked at his hip to hold him in place.

Cursing under her breath, Kate released him with a mumbled, "Sorry."

He caught her wrist and drew her into a calming embrace. Lips to her temple, lungs inhaling her scent, he whispered, "I wasn't complaining."

**~*~*~ See that little review button down there? Reviews make me happy. When I'm happy, I write more fuzzies. Just sayin' :-)**


	16. Chapter 16

In the cocoon of privacy provided by the limousine, Kate straightened her dress, realigning what had gone askew under Rick's caresses. She grabbed the compact mirror from her clutch and squinted in an ill-fated attempt to see all of her face at one time.

"How's my makeup?" she asked him.

"Gorgeous."

She eyed him dubiously, then checked again for herself in the small mirror. Her hands trembled slightly as she ran them through her hair – now freed from the clips that had held it earlier. That had been Rick's fault, too.

"Ready?"

At her affirming nod, he leaned in for a soft, sweet kiss that spoke more of love than passion, though that lay close beneath the surface. "Thank you," he whispered.

"For what?" she countered, her voice matching the low, husky volume he'd established.

"For saying yes to tonight. For putting yourself out there – in public – with me. I know you hate this kind of stuff."

She smiled and traced the outline of his jaw with a tender touch. "Yeah. I do. But I love you. And – "

He knew his public persona was so against her private character; her choice to step out of her comfort zone for him – again – spoke more loudly to him than all the words in the dictionary ever could. This time, his kiss was quick and strong, and Kate was glad she was still seated against the plush upholstery. She knew otherwise she would have certainly lost the ability to stand on her own.

"And… some things are just worth the effort, ya know?" she managed to finish.

"I couldn't have said it better myself," he breathed, taking a moment to fill his lungs with air before waggling his eyebrows in her direction. "And I'm the writer."

With a rakish grin, he opened the door and offered his hand to help her out of the car. He couldn't resist tucking her fingers into the crook of his arm and tried to communicate with a gentle squeeze how proud he was of her.

Pleased that no flashing cameras or shouts for a picture greeted them, Kate allowed herself to relax and walked with Rick into the trendy restaurant. Yes, there were still questions that needed to be answered, obstacles that needed to be resolved, fears that needed to be allayed, walls that needed to be destroyed. But those could all wait for later.

Right now was about what they _did_ know – they were on the edge of a greater love than either of them had ever felt before. And, as Kate let her eyes rake affectionately over Rick's face, she realized that none of that other stuff mattered nearly as much as she thought it did.

* * *

><p>"Mr. Castle?"<p>

The waiter's voice broke through the romantic haze that had enveloped their table, and two pairs of eyes turned toward the young man in surprise. His voice lowered even further as he leaned toward Rick.

"Mr. Castle, the maitre'd wanted you to be aware that a significant crowd of photographers have gathered outside. It seems that someone tipped them off to your presence here tonight." He watched realization dawn on the couple and added, "He asked me to say that you are welcome to use the back exit when you are ready to leave."

"Thank you, Thomas," Rick murmured, smiling in dismissal and turning his attention back to Kate even as dread pooled in his stomach. "Kate – "

She shook her head, cutting off his apology. "Rick, it's fine."

When his eyebrow arched in disbelief, she dipped her head shyly. "Okay, so it's not fine. But… if I want our relationship to work, I'm going to have to just suck it up and be a big girl about the public side of your life. I do… so I will."

"You know I would have bought your dinner anyway, right? You didn't have to butter me up by saying all the right things," he teased.

Kate laughed and swatted his shoulder gently. "Let's get this over with."

Her resigned sigh brought a fond smile to his lips, and he raised her hand to graze her knuckles with a kiss. "Are we escaping out the back?"

She hesitated, her bottom lip drawn involuntarily between her teeth. "I have to face them sooner or later," she finally decided. "Might as well get used to it now."

"I love you," he murmured against her temple after draping her wrap around her shoulders.

"Yeah, yeah." Her quirked grin delighted him, and all other thought quickly flew from his mind when she adjusted the open collar of his dress shirt and smoothed the lapels of his suit coat with her very distracting hands. "Let's do this."

He wisely refrained from pointing out that she sounded like someone about to interrogate a suspect, choosing instead to catch up with her before she had the chance to enter the paparazzi fray without him.

His hand stayed possessively at the small of her back, the gentle pressure of his shoulder against hers giving reassurance when she would have bolted. Heart clenching at the tension he felt in her stance, he pasted on his best 'it's all for the fans' smile, and they faced the intrusive crowd of flashbulbs together.

"Rick! When did you start dating Nikki Heat?"  
>"Kate! How does it feel going from muse to mistress?"<br>"Rick!"  
>"Kate!"<br>"Rick!"  
>"Rick! Is this all just publicity for the new book?"<br>"Rick! Are you officially off the market?"  
>"Kate! Who's sexier – Rook or Castle?"<p>

Rick raised his arm to gain the attention of those clamoring for the next juicy headline, and they all fell silent save the clicking and whirring and flashing of their ever-active cameras.

"Every writer needs inspiration." The ravenous pack of reporters and paparazzi hung on his every word, including the woman currently intoxicating him with her nearness. He knew he should say something about his muse and be done with it, but his heart had other ideas. "Every man needs completion. I was lucky enough to find both. I'll let you fill in the blanks."

With a dismissive 'Excuse us', he herded Kate toward the waiting limo and climbed in beside her, drawing a long breath as the driver shut the door. He barely had time to recover his bearings before Kate launched herself into his arms and captivated him with a passionate kiss.

She pulled away after a brief eternity and framed his face with her hands as she spoke, "That's the sweetest thing anyone has ever said about me."

He let her read his eyes all the way into his soul. "I meant it."

"I know you did … and I love you even more for it." Another kiss, and she drew back to look at him again. "Do you have to be home at any certain time tonight?"

"No. Alexis is out and Mother –," he answered, slightly puzzled until he noticed the blatant desire in her gaze. "Oh!"

Reaching around her, stealing a nibble along her collar bone, he pushed the button that would activate the intercom between passenger and driver.

"Hey, Scott – How fast can this limo go?"

* * *

><p><strong>Reviews feed my muse ... (hint!hint!)<strong>


	17. Chapter 17

**~*~A/N: Two things about this chapter that need to be pointed out- **

**1) if this were a movie (and don't we wish!) the first part would probably be PG13. Those of you with imaginations can fill in the blanks - you won't get anything explicit here. So... maybe a T+ ... definitely not an M ... probably still well within a T rating but I'm paranoid :-P**

**2) this chapter is insanely long! There was no good place to cut it off without making it too short. So, grab a cup of coffee (or whatever your poison) and settle in ;-)**

* * *

><p>Kate lay awake in the darkness, her fingers lazily tracing patterns across Rick's bare shoulder, his breath tickling her skin. Their first time had been hot and frantic as 4 years of fantasies came together in a frenzied tangle of need. She had cried his name at the moment of their joining; he had groaned hers at the explosions of sensation that conquered them both. Their second time had been even more intense, but slow and deliberate and deliciously satisfying.<p>

She smiled in contentment as her toes curled with memories of their lovemaking. It had been everything she'd ever thought it would be – times about 100. A soft snore erupted from the man in her arms, and her chest shook lightly with a quiet chuckle.

"I don't even know where my wall is anymore," she murmured into the night, and the man in her arms surprised her by laughing.

"I thought you were asleep," she chided, ruffling his hair.

"I was." He propped his chin on her chest and smiled at her. "And then my pillow started moving so I woke up."

She sighed happily and snuggled against him as he shifted to lie on his side. Pulling her closer, he buried a kiss in her shoulder and splayed his hand across her abdomen.

"This is a first for me, you know," Kate finally broke the comfortable silence.

His body tensing in bewilderment, Rick lifted his head to search her eyes. "You don't mean …"

"What? No, no, no," she laughed. "I meant – letting a guy stay until morning."

He was quiet for a moment as he processed the significance of what she was saying. "Well, it's not morning yet. You could still kick me out," he teased after a bit.

"I could," she agreed, drawing him down for a slow, lingering kiss. "But I won't."

Returning her kiss, his hands began to roam, and she surrendered to his unspoken request, her body answering without words the question he hadn't yet verbalized. She was pretty sure she could still see the wall in the distance, but at the moment she frankly just didn't care.

* * *

><p>"Girl, did you <em>hear<em> what he said about you last night?"

Kate looked up at her friend in bemusement. "Considering I was standing right next to him, yes," she chuckled. "Dare I ask how _you_ heard?"

Lanie slapped a newspaper paper down on Kate's desk and nearly squealed as she pointed out the article on PageSix. A nice picture of them outside the restaurant was tucked under the headline _**From Muse to Marriage?**_

As terrified as that 'marriage' word made her, it actually didn't petrify her nearly as much as it should have. That in itself was more unsettling than having her private life displayed for all of New York to see like a bunch of voyeurs.

_**A queen for the Castle? Notorious ladies' man, popular mystery writer Richard Castle appears to be taken. After a romantic, secluded dinner date last evening at the**__**Central Lounge in Astoria, the author and his date (none other than his lovely muse, Detective Kate Beckett) paused to talk with our reporter.**_

"Actually," Kate corrected inanely – like it mattered, "We didn't so much pause to talk as we were blocked by a barrage of cameras and questions."

_**In response to our question as to whether or not he was officially off the market, Mr. Castle said, "Every writer needs inspiration. Every man needs completion. I was lucky enough to find both. I'll let you fill in the blanks." **_

Kate blushed as she read the words that still played through her head like a broken record – one she didn't want to fix.

_**This is one mystery we can solve on our own. Is Richard Castle off the market and looking to settle down? We believe that's a 'case closed'. **_

"The local gossip blogs have a picture of Castle leaving your apartment building this morning," Lanie crooned. "They say he stayed the night." She propped herself up on the edge of Kate's desk and leaned closer, her eyes twinkling. "I need details."

Before Kate could respond, the elevator doors dinged open and the man in question stepped into the bullpen, two customary cups of coffee in his hands.

"Later," she promised the medical examiner in a hushed whisper.

"Ladies," Rick greeted, reserving a wink for Kate as he placed her coffee in front of her on her desk.

"Loverboy," Lanie replied in turn, laughing at his startled face. "You kids behave now."

He watched her mutely as she left, turning to Kate with a grimace. "What did you tell her?"

"I didn't tell her anything. She'd already read all about it before I got here." Gesturing to the paper Lanie had left behind, she leaned back in her chair and took a grateful sip of coffee as Rick read the article for himself.

"Okay, that's not too bad," he sighed in relief, plopping down in his chair.

"Don't count your chickens before they're hatched." Kate swiveled her monitor to show him the blog post that Lanie had just emailed to her. "Apparently, it's all over New York that we slept together last night."

"Are you – okay?" he asked tentatively, watching her closely to gauge her reaction to this invasion of their privacy.

"No," she shook her head. "I hate this." She shot him a tenuous smile. "But you're worth it. Last night … was worth it."

Returning her smile, he glanced around the bullpen. "Has Gates heard about this yet/"

"I don't know," Kate began, but was interrupted by their chief's voice carrying to them from her office.

"Beckett! Castle! My office."

"Umm… I think she has," Kate amended. Her eyes darted nervously to Rick as they walked toward what very well might be their death. Okay, so perhaps that was a bit melodramatic… but at least the death of their working partnership. _That_ was more than plausible.

When they reached her office, the captain closed the door and shut the blinds that lined the windows. "Is this true?" Gates pointed to a printout of one of the gossip blogs Kate hadn't seen yet. "Or is it just scuttlebutt?"

"Publicity," Castle blurted out, causing both women to stare at him. "It's all a publicity stunt for my newest book."

When Gates turned to Kate for confirmation, the detective merely gave her a tight smile and held her breath. Nodding noncommittally, their captain reached for a file at the corner of her desk even as she sat down, indicating that they should do the same.

"Well, as they say, today's gossip is tomorrow's headline." Her eyebrows arched, waiting for them to 'fess up. "But as long as it's out there today, this can still work," Gates finished cryptically when no confessions were forthcoming.

Flipping open the folder, she handed Kate a report from the top. "This is strictly a favor for a friend. This is _not_ official police business." She glanced between the partners, her gaze resolute. "Are we clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"Yes ma'am – sir," Castle echoed, wincing at the glare he received for his misspoken address.

"My college roommate has her own wedding planning business. Someone, it seems, has been blackmailing her clients over the past several months."

"An employee?" Kate asked. "A competitor?"

Gates shrugged. "She says no, but… who knows. Anyway, as it turns out, either the bride or the groom – or maybe both – have been threatened with exposure of some sort of dirty little secret if they follow through with the marriage. Deanne has lost 25 clients to this blackmailer so far."

Leaning forward, she steepled her fingers and rested her chin against them. "Needless to say, she's going bankrupt, and she doesn't know what to do."

"And obviously she wants it kept quiet because if word got out it could put her out of business permanently – even if the blackmailer is caught down the line," Castle offered slowly.

She looked like she would chastise him for the interjection, but instead she nodded. "I know we usually deal with homicide – and thankfully so far this case hasn't reached that level yet, but when you're dealing with this kind of blackmail it's really only a matter of time."

Taking a deep breath, she pushed herself to a standing position and leveled them both with a look that demanded their attention. "I also know that we've gotten off to a bit of a rough start between us, but no one can question the success of your partnership. I'm asking for your help."

"What do you want us to do?" Kate asked.

"I want you to get married."

* * *

><p><strong>~*~ Insert shameless plea for reviews here ~*~<strong>


	18. Chapter 18

"_I want you to get married."_

"I'm sorry – what, now?" Castle's dumbfounded words perfectly matched the expression on Kate's face.

He wondered if Gates knew what this would do to Kate's wall. For that matter, he wondered if _Kate_ knew what this would do to Kate's wall. Either way, he was pretty sure that he and the wall would become better acquainted when the dust from this had settled.

"Well, at least engaged," Gates was relenting when Castle tuned back in to the conversation. "We need a team to go undercover as a couple who is planning their upcoming wedding. With all the _publicity_ you two have garnered lately, it shouldn't raise suspicion to send you in as our eyes and ears."

Neither partner missed the special emphasis she put on their explanation for the recent photos.

"You mean, as your bait," Kate interjected, drawing a stern glare from the older woman.

Ignoring the detective's comment, Gates spent the next few minutes explaining what would be expected of them before releasing the shell-shocked couple to their duties. They returned to Kate's desk and merely stared at anything but each other until Kate finally broke the silence.

"What just happened?"

Castle rubbed his hand across his jaw. "I have no idea. Except, I'm pretty sure I have some shopping to do." Gates had said that she would personally reimburse them for all of their expenses when the case was closed, if the department balked at doing so, but Castle knew there was no way he was sticking to a budget for this particular purchase.

He grabbed her left hand and pondered over her ring finger, caressing it and stroking it under the guise of determining a size – and slowly driving Kate to the edge of fidgety in the process.

"Castle, if you want to know my ring size, all you have to do is ask," she chastised, tugging her hand from his grasp before they garnered any more attention than they were already drawing.

"It's okay – I already know it."

She blinked in surprise. "You know my ring size? Just from feeling me up a minute ago?"

His eyes flashed at the innuendo. "I can see we're going to have to spend more time practicing the 'feeling Kate up' part of our relationship – if that passes for it in your book."

"Whatever." But her carefree dismissal did nothing to conceal the grin she couldn't stop. "So, all-knowing one, what _is_ my ring size?"

"Not going to tell you," he said. "Besides, you've already taken away most of my element of surprise by being in on this undercover proposal before I can even plan it. A guy's gotta hang on to _some_ secrets."

"Castle," she began warily, her gaze warning and uneasy. "You… you didn't arrange this somehow with Gates, did you?"

He tried not to be hurt; he knew what an upheaval her life had become in the past few days and was grateful enough that she hadn't fled to the proverbial hills after last night's events.

"Kate… For starters, do you even think Gates would go along with such a scheme if I actually had the indecency to suggest it?"

"No, you're right," Kate acquiesced. "I'm being paranoid. It's just –"

"I know," he interrupted softly, covering her hand with his in a light caress. Invading her space just enough to bring the fidgets back, he waited until her eyes were locked on his before adding, "This proposal is all about being caught by the press. When I propose to you for real, I'll make sure no one knows about it until you want them to."

Taking advantage of her inability to breathe, he stole a quick kiss and grabbed his jacket. On his way out of the bullpen, he stopped and turned to add one more flutter to the nest that seemed to have released themselves in her stomach. "And yes, Kate, I said _when_, not _if_."

She stared blankly as he disappeared into the elevator, finally speaking into the void that he'd vacated. "Seriously – where is my wall?"

* * *

><p>After Castle texted Martha and Alexis about a mandatory family meeting that afternoon – there was no way he wanted them finding out about even a fake engagement from the press – he made his way into a jewelry store he'd had his eye on for the last year.<p>

"Hello, sir. How can I help you today?" The older Oriental man behind the counter looked up at him, a smile wrinkling the corners of his eyes, and did a double take. "Hey – aren't you that mystery writer?"

"Yes," Castle replied smoothly. "Richard Castle." Giving the man a firm handshake, he gestured to the jewelry cases that lined the showroom. "I'm looking for an engagement ring. Can you point me in the right direction?"

There were dozens of gorgeous diamonds with gorgeous settings that would have looked gorgeous on Kate's gorgeous hand. At first, he feared he wouldn't possibly be able to pick one… but then he saw _it_.

"That one," he jabbed at the glass. "I want to see that one."

"Very good choice," the owner complimented, easing the velvet cushion that cradled the ring from the confines of the display case and placing it before Rick with a flourish.

A brilliant round diamond flanked by rows of 11 smaller stones on each side sat atop a palladium band that sported an antique scroll design. It was stunning… just like Kate. And it was her size.

"What carat is the center stone?"

"3 carat."

"Color?"

"Colorless," was the owner's smiling reply. "Highest and rarest color for a diamond."

"Translated: most expensive," Castle smirked goodnaturedly.

"Actually, a more accurate translation would be most valuable."

Castle laughed at the shopkeeper's correction and nodded, turning the ring over between his fingers to catch the light.

"Clarity?"

"VVS." The older man began to explain but Castle cut him off with a friendly grin.

"Very very slightly included. Extremely small imperfections, barely visible even to an expert under 10x magnification." At the owner's surprised look, Castle explained with a shrug, "Research for one of my first books."

"Ah," he said in understanding. "So you know this is a very special ring. Very rare."

"Yes," Castle agreed. "Just like the woman I'm buying it for."

"So you would like to buy this one?"

"Yes, I think I would." Castle couldn't give words to the emotions that flooded him as the owner began to write up a ticket. This was different than his previous engagement ring purchases. Worlds apart, in fact. This one was the last one he would ever buy. He could feel it in his soul.

"There is a matching wedding band to go along with the Johanna. Would you like that as well?"

Castle halted in his search for his wallet and gaped at the other man as something indescribable gripped his heart. "Wh – what did you say the ring is called?"

"The Johanna."

Tears dampened the creases of Rick's eyes as he struggled to control the sudden swirling of his head. If he'd any doubts before that moment about whether or not this was the perfect ring for Kate – which he hadn't – the name of the ring would certainly have obliterated them.

"Yes," he managed to choke past the lump in his throat. "Yes – I want the wedding band to go along with it. Absolutely."

And then, the words he hoped he would soon be hearing from Kate and echoing back to her, "I do."

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><p><strong>~*~ Reviews = a happy me. A happy me = more fuzzies. ~*~<strong>


	19. Chapter 19

**~*~ Just a short one today - life got in the way this weekend! ~*~**

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><p>"So… you talked to Martha and Alexis?" Kate asked, her phone cradled between her ear and her shoulder as she rifled through the clothes in her closet, trying to find a particular sweater she wanted to wear.<p>

"Yeah," Rick's voice was slow and sleepy, leaving Kate to wonder if he'd called her right after waking from a nap.

"Do you have this fake proposal thing planned yet?" she questioned as she spied the sweater and plucked it from the shelf on which it was folded.

"Aw c'mon Kate! You're just no fun."

"Castle." Her breath huffed in the slightest hint of annoyance. "This isn't a real proposal. You remember that, right?"

"Yeah," he whined, and she could hear him stretching. "But I'd still like to surprise you with it."

"That's sweet," Kate allowed. "But don't."

"Speaking of sweet… Alexis wanted me to invite you to go with her to this cupcake baking/decorating/Idonotknowwhatelseing class at that fancy-schmancy bakery that's on one of those cooking networks on TV."

She laughed out loud. "Gee, Castle. Could you get any vaguer?" Holding up several different scarves, she twisted her lips to the side as she debated which one looked best with her sweater and jeans.

"Have you always had to know so much detail or is this need of yours just particularly directed at me today?"

"Another layer to the onion, Castle. You learn a lot when you keep peeling."

His voice dropped to a low, sexy hum. "I can think of some things I learned while peeling your clothes off last night."

She could feel the flush that rushed through her body at his words. "I seem to remember less peeling and more ripping."

His gravelly chuckle turned her knees to jello. "If you'd taken me up on my offer when we first met, I might not have been so desperate to make love to you. Besides, I promised to buy you another dress."

"Now that you've bedded me, does this mean I'm old news and the rest of my clothes aren't at risk?"

"Never," his words turned to honey. "I'm sure I will eventually have to buy you a whole new wardrobe. You intoxicate me, Kate." He was almost whispering now, and she knew he most likely was no longer alone. "The first time I met you, I thought I could be satisfied by one night with you. That changed after our first case. And now, I know I will _never_ recover from my addiction to you, Kate."

She couldn't speak for a minute, in awe of the freedom they now had to say everything they'd kept bottled up for too long. "Is anyone else going to be home tonight?" she finally asked, her breathless voice stirring his body to life.

"Just until we're done with dinner," he assured her hoarsely. "And if Alexis and Mother don't leave after that, they will when I start ravishing you on the kitchen table. Trust me."

She laughed again. "Castle…"

He'd noticed that she laughed more now – he loved that he had something to do with that. He'd also noticed that she still called him 'Castle' when she was pretending to be exasperated with him.

"See you in a half hour?"

She nodded, even though he couldn't see her. "Is it weird that I'm nervous? I mean, I've eaten with Alexis and your mother before."

He smiled, thinking how cute she was when she was unsettled. "It's not weird. It's normal. You've never eaten with all of us as my girlfriend before. It's a little weird for them – and me – too."

Glancing at the clock, he winced, "But my spaghetti sauce _is_ going to be weird if I don't add the super-secret ingredient to it in the next 60 seconds or so."

"Well, we wouldn't want that," she teased. "See you soon." She hesitated, then added. "This super-secret ingredient … it's something normal, right?"

"There you go with the details again."

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><p><strong>~*~ THANK YOU for all the reviews so far ... but you know, more is always better haha! <strong>


	20. Chapter 20

***~* Is it just me, or does anyone else want to cry at the previews for next week? Argh! How long will they torture us! **

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><p>From her perch at the piano, Alexis saw her grandmother approaching and put a finger to her own lips to shush the older woman before she could utter the question in her eyes. She nodded her head in the direction of the kitchen and felt Martha's hand come to rest on her shoulder as she took in the view.<p>

Richard and Kate stood shoulder to shoulder at the sink, washing dishes with a rhythm that hinted at years of marriage to someone who didn't know differently.

No more than a few seconds passed between casual caresses.

Rick put his hand at the small of Kate's back as he leaned around her under the guise of grabbing the last of the pans from dinner.

Kate reached up to whisk away a soap bubble that had stowed away on Rick's cheek.

He let his fingers hook over hers when he handed her a dish to dry.

Alexis smiled at the picture they made and scooted over so Martha could join her on the piano bench. "I've never seen him look this happy," his daughter whispered almost absently.

It was the perpetual crinkles around his eyes that made her heart swell. The stress lines, that had taken up residence after Kate's shooting, were gone now and had been replaced with contentment unlike anything Alexis had ever known her dad to possess.

"Does he know you're out here?" Martha murmured against her granddaughter's ear.

Alexis nodded. "I think he's letting me watch on purpose. He knows I've been worried about him lately. He wants me to see how 'right' he is now."

"How long do you think this undercover engagement business will stay fake?"

"I think it will be real for Dad the whole time," Alexis theorized. "I think it will be for Kate, too, but she'll act like it's not."

A sudden flurry of shrieks and giggles from the kitchen drew her attention away from her grandmother to the tickling war playing out in front of her. It was really more of a one-sided battle – with Rick clearly having the upper hand. Alexis had a feeling that Kate was letting him win, a fact that endeared the detective to the daughter even further.

He grabbed Kate around the waist, mercilessly drawing fits of laughter from her slender frame by his unrelenting assault in her most ticklish places.

She kicked her legs up and out in an attempt to leverage herself free of his arms, pushing against the island to throw him off balance.

Releasing her to regain his footing, he caught her against him, chest to chest, pinning her against the counter and annihilating her retaliation with a dizzying kiss.

Rick's hand left Kate's hair long enough to grace the spies on the piano bench with a dismissive wave.

"He doesn't have to tell me twice," Alexis muttered, running into Martha in her hurry to leave, clamping her hands over her ears to muffle the soft moans that had replaced the giggles in the kitchen. Something clattered loudly – sounding suspiciously like dishes falling to the floor – and Alexis whimpered. There are some things a daughter just doesn't want to see. Or hear. Or imagine.

In fact, it was probably better just to leave the loft altogether, she surmised, noting that her grandmother was right behind her.

The door closed behind them with a loud 'clunk', and Rick grinned into the kiss.

_Alone at last._

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><p>"I told you they'd leave when I started ravishing you on the kitchen table," Rick pointed out between gasps for air, his chest heaving to replenish in the oxygen that had escaped his body.<p>

"You were right," Kate breathed, her arm draped across her forehead as she struggled to bring her sense back to reality. "Except it was actually on the island …"

She glanced toward where he lay, next to her on the kitchen floor, and smiled at the dazed look on his face. Her expression probably wasn't much better, she reasoned. That had quite simply been _extraordinary_.

"Hmmm," he agreed and flopped to his side to trail his finger along her chest. He loved that he could stir her body to life with the simplest of caresses. "I guess we'll have to save the table for another time."

He kissed her, then pulled back to twist a lock of hair around his finger. "Move in with me while we're undercover."

When she merely stared at him, he added, "This case – it bothers me. I don't know why. But I'd feel better if you were here – where I can know you're safe."

He was rehearsing his argument in his head when she whispered, "Okay."

His hand stopped his journey around her navel, stilling in surprise at her acceptance of his offer.

Turning to face him, she ran her hand along the stubble of his jaw and feathered her lips across his chin. "But … it's only so _I_ can keep an eye on _you_," she amended, evoking a laugh from the man who was currently marking a path of kisses along her forehead.

"Fair enough," he allowed tolerantly, thinking he would agree to pretty much anything right then. Her body was pressed against his, the sensation of skin to skin wiping out most coherent thought from his brain.

Goodness, he loved this woman.


	21. Chapter 21

_**~*~Two days later~*~**_

"Kate. Relax."

His words did little to calm her, but the love shining in his gaze sent a wave of peace crashing over her pounding heart. In a few minutes, the man she loved more than she even realized would be down on one knee, with a department-budget ring and a question that was sure to draw the attention of everyone from the restaurant patrons to the press to, hopefully, a blackmailer. She would say 'yes' – and she would mean it – and that thought scared her to death.

It was fake – she had to keep reminding herself – and yet she knew there would be truth behind the façade.

Truth in his words.

Truth in hers.

And then she would go back to his loft (her home for the foreseeable future) and to his bed (a place that was becoming all too comfortable for her) and to his family (who already felt like her own). How could she possibly go back to 'normal' – whatever that was – when this was over?

"Just keep looking into my eyes," he was saying. "I'll hold you steady."

She didn't doubt that. Except that those same eyes that would indeed hold her in place would also send her soaring with love and desire and need.

The waiter brought their dessert, and Kate's hands began to shake. Rick covered her trembling fingers with a soothing grip and whispered for her ears only, "Would marrying me be this traumatic for you? Really?"

He couldn't hide the hurt in his gaze, and the tears she'd been holding back surfaced in the green eyes that looked back at him. "No," she managed to speak with a watery smile. "That's what scares me."

He understood, and she loved him for it. Pressing a kiss to her knuckles, he shifted and knelt in front of her, still holding her hand. A chorus of surprised gasps ricocheted from table to table in the Central Lounge, the classy restaurant in Astoria where they'd had their first (real) date. Her eyes locked on his, and everything else faded away.

Fishing the velvet ring box from the pocket of his sports coat, a small chuckle left his lips. He took a deep breath, rubbing his thumb reassuringly across the back of Kate's hand, and began the speech he'd practiced in front of the mirror earlier that day.

"Kate… I've thought a long time about what I wanted to say tonight. I'm a writer, after all; I should be able to come up with words that make sense. But I couldn't. So I turned to one of the greats and borrowed from him."

She brushed her fingers along the hair above his ear and laughed as his next words registered in her muddled brain.

"Say that you'll marry me. Sometimes carry me. And I will be there forever more for you."

"Are you quoting a Neil Diamond song?"

"Yes," he replied. "Now sshh."

He continued with a quirky grin, his eyes a little moist in spite of himself. Its purpose might be to advance their undercover assignment, but he meant every word.

"You'll know, by the love in my eyes and the beat of my heart. I'll be there."

_She would. She did. _

"You'll know, cause you'll never be lonely again." His hand tightened around hers, and she used her free hand to swipe at the tears that had spilled across her lashes.

_She wouldn't be. She wasn't._

"Anytime, anywhere. This I promise if you marry me." His voice grew husky. "Promise you'll stay with me. We'll make some memories. And maybe a dream or two will come true, who knows."

_They would. They had. _

"This I can say for sure. All that I have is yours. You'll never wonder where I stand. It shows."

_She knew it was. She knew it did._

"I won't ever forget these words."

_She wouldn't either. _

"And I'll love you for all I'm worth – if you say you'll marry me."

He cracked the velvet jeweler's box, and Kate sucked in a sharp breath at the stunning beauty of the ring nestled in his hands. _This_ was _not_ within the department budget.

"Marry me, Kate."

A hush fell over the restaurant as everyone waited to hear her answer. She grinned and nodded her head, vanquishing some renegade tears with another whisk of her hand. "Yes, you goofball. Of course I'll marry you."

The ring was poised at her left hand, and her finger quivered as he slid it into place. It quite literally took her breath away.

And if she had any air left in her lungs, the kiss that followed most certainly stole it away.


	22. Chapter 22

"What are you doing?" Laughter laced the question as Kate watched Rick painstakingly cut an article from the latest gossip rag he'd found at the newsstand down the street.

"I'm adding this one to my collection," he explained patiently.

He looked every bit the little boy, his tongue sticking out the side of his mouth in concentration, and Kate felt as though her heart would burst with love. Unable to stop herself, she walked up behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and laid her cheek against the warmth of his back.

"Which collection would that be?"

Successfully making one last snip with the scissors, he brandished a manila envelope from the counter and dumped out the contents for her perusal. "My favorite articles about our proposal. This one," he waved the most recent clipping over his shoulder, "has my favorite pictures so far."

She took it from him, keeping one arm snug at his waist, and smiled fondly at the largest of the 3 photographs that accompanied the text. It showed Castle down on one knee, gazing up at Kate with love painted blatantly across his face. Kate seemed equally besotted, entranced by the words coming from his mouth.

"I love you."

He placed one hand over hers and squeezed. "Back at ya, KB."

"I meant what I said last night, you know."

His grip tightened. "When you said yes?"

"No," Kate teased matter-of-factly. "When I said you were a goofball."

"What did he do now?" Alexis queried, passing by them with a bemused glance on her way to dig in the fridge for a snack.

"Hey!" Rick huffed indignantly. "I'll have you know that I was completely romantic last night. Swoon-worthy, even."

"Dad, I _really_ don't want to know what you do when you guys go to bed," Alexis covered his mouth with her hand to stem his flow of words as Kate buried her face in his back to hide her embarrassment.

"Mmpf, mmpf, mmm, mmpf," he continued, undeterred, and sent his daughter into a flurry of screeched giggles when he finally just gave up and raspberried her hand.

"Gross, Dad!"

Kate rose up on her bare feet to rest her chin on Rick's shoulder and grinned at their father-daughter antics. She thought of her own father – of the knowing timbre to his voice when she'd told him about their undercover assignment, of how he seemed to know a lot more than she was voicing, of the way he seemed to be a few steps ahead of her in the conversation.

"For your information, daughter, I was talking about my suave and debonair proposal to the lovely Detective Beckett. All the papers are buzzing about it this morning."

"Yeah? My friend Sabrina texted me all about it. Too bad it was fake," the redhead flung back impishly, taking a large bite of an apple and meandering casually from the room.

"You've set the bar awfully high for whenever you decide to ask her for real."

Kate automatically tensed, and Castle's hand shot to hers, closing over her fingers with a reassuring warmth. "She's just being a teenager," he promised quietly.

"Richard, darling," Martha nearly waltzed into the kitchen and stopped short with a wry smile in front of the couple. "Sweetheart, you appear to have a growth on your back. Hello, Kate."

"Hi, Martha."

"I think she's permanently welded to him, Grams," Alexis quipped as she returned to the kitchen for a glass of ice water.

"Darling, perhaps fake engagements are different, but last time I checked it was customary to give your fiancée a diamond ring rather than attach yourself at the hip."

Rick's chest rumbled with his chuckles as Kate's own laughter tickled his spine. Grabbing her hand that held his ring, he held it out for display even as he maintained his grip on the fingers still at his waist. Alexis squealed and quickly set her water glass on the counter, sliding across the floor in her sock-feet to see the ring for herself.

"Oh man, Dad! This is _gorgeous_! Kate, did you just _die_ when he gave it to you?"

"Yes, about this ring, Rick," Kate released him and poked him in the side until he turned to face her. "There is absolutely no way this is within Gates' budget. What were you thinking?"

Kissing the ring, he invaded her personal space, noting with great pleasure that she didn't move. When he spoke, his voice was low and gravelly. "I was thinking that the ring reminded me of you – a little bit traditional, a little bit sassy, a whole lot of beautiful."

He did it again, she realized – stole her ability to form coherent thought and rendered her incapable of doing much more than staring at him inanely. "That's … sweet," she finally managed. "Really sweet."

Martha cleared her throat, exchanging a knowing look with her granddaughter. "So, what do you two have planned for today?"

Kate stepped back, hoping some distance from this man (who distracted her to no end) would clear her head. "Well… um, we're going to move the last of my stuff over here. At least the stuff I'm keeping at the loft while we're undercover."

Her eyes flicked to Rick's, knowing that he would be perfectly fine should she decide to make their new living arrangements permanent. She just wasn't ready to go there yet… but she could already tell after just a couple of days that this – this _family_ – was going to become addicting.

He saw the inner war reflected on her features and gave the escape he was so accustomed to providing her. "And … we've got an appointment with the wedding planner at 3:00."

The mood in the kitchen sobered instantly as the real world of crime and police work invaded the cheery ambiance.

"You'll be careful, right guys?" Alexis was the first to break the grim silence. "I mean – I really like having Kate around, Dad. Please don't go and screw this up."

"I'll do my best," he promised his little girl, pulling her to his side and kissing the top of her head with a loud smack. Winking at Kate, he added, "I really like having her around, too."

"Well, if my opinion matters, I really like having her here as well," Martha interjected. She smiled at Kate. "Looks like you're stuck with us, kiddo."

_I __hope __so_, Kate couldn't help but admit to herself as she allowed herself to be embraced by the older woman. _Because __right __now,__I __really __don__'__t __want __to __be __unstuck._

* * *

><p>"You know," Rick began, his attention focused on the clothes he was attempting to fold into a suitcase. "You got something today that no one has ever gotten before."<p>

Kate looked up from where she was sorting through her shoes, grimacing at the current state of a sweater he was manhandling. "Castle, you're going to ruin all of my clothes."

She unfolded her legs from beneath her and stood to her feet, taking the sweater from his hands and bumping him out of the way with a hip. "So, what did I get today?"

Wrapping his arms around her waist, he swiped a kiss across her ear and murmured, "The stamp of approval from _both_ Mother and Alexis."

She glanced at him in surprise. "They've never liked any of your other girlfriends before?"

He arched an eyebrow poetically. "You've met some of them. What do you think?"

The thought secretly pleased her, and she couldn't suppress a satisfied smirk. He coughed a laugh and began nibbling lightly down her neck. "Are you gloating, Detective?"

"Hmmm…" She pretended to consider her answer, gracing him with a dazzling smile after a brief moment. "Maybe a little bit, yeah."

Capturing her lips in a gentle kiss that quickly deepened, he eased away and held her against his chest where she could feel the soothing beat of his heart. "I like that you're gloating over me," he admitted almost shyly.

She chewed on her bottom lip and fiddled with the buttons of his shirt. "Rick … no one else has convinced me to move this much of my stuff to their place before. Especially for a temporary arrangement."

His fingers danced the path of her spine as he debated back and forth over whether or not to say what he really wanted to say. He decided to go for it.

"It doesn't have to be temporary, Kate."

Stiffening, she tried to pull away but he held her fast. "No more running. You promised," he reminded her with a tender brush of his lips against her forehead.

She stayed. But she schooled her features, shutting him out, and he sighed. "No more rebuilding the wall, either, Kate."

It was her turn to sigh. "Sorry," she mumbled into the fabric of his shirt. Pressing a kiss to the pulse at his throat, she wrapped her arms around his neck and drew confidence from the surplus he seemed to have about their relationship.

"We don't have to talk about it any more right now," he told her. "I just want you to know that the loft is your home for as long as you want it to be. _I__'__m_ your home for as long as you want me."

She wanted to tell him that she'd always want him – and it was the truth. But, though the word sat on her tongue, she couldn't seem to force it past her lips.

Everything was happening too quickly. A little more than a week ago, she'd had a wall firmly in place, protecting her from everything that scared her. Now, it lay in shambles at the feet of the man whose fingers were currently splayed across her back and tangled in her hair, the man whose face was buried in the crook of her neck.

'Always' was such a simple word – but it meant everything.


	23. Chapter 23

"Bridesmaids?"

Kate looked to where Rick sat, his pen poised over the questionnaire they had been given to fill out while they waited to see their wedding planner. They wouldn't be meeting with Gates' friend, Miranda, as she rarely planned any weddings herself these days. Instead, they had been assigned one of her staff members in keeping with the status quo.

"I don't know, Castle. Does it matter?"

He raised an eyebrow at her snippiness and put the pen down to scoot closer to her on the loveseat they currently occupied. Brushing some hair from her face and looking every bit the completely smitten groom (which really wasn't too difficult), he leaned in to nuzzle her nose.

"It matters to Gates," he chided lightly, keeping one eye on the receptionist and noting her curious and not-so-surreptitious glances in their direction. "Remember, you're supposed to be a blushing bride, Kate, not a bridezilla."

"I'm sorry," she exhaled. "I just …"

"I know."

And he did. He always did. That was the problem. He knew her too well, and sometimes – like now – that made her panic a little. Okay, a lot.

Resting her forehead against his with a bit of a whack behind the gesture, she breathed in his scent and forced herself to play along. "Just 2," she told him.

He touched her lips with a tender kiss and pulled away to jot down her answer, his pen scraping against the clipboard and grating on Kate's mood in the process. She felt a headache coming on, and she wished she had some painkillers in her purse.

"Who are they?"

"Who are who?" she asked, her brow knitted with an emotion he couldn't quite define.

"The bridesmaids. Who will they be?"

"Castle." He could tell she was trying. He could also tell she wasn't trying hard enough. What had happened to sour her mood so much?

"Humor me," he coaxed, then held up the questionnaire. "Besides, it's on the paper."

"Lanie and Alexis." She glanced down at the flower arrangement on the table, finding a sudden interest in the small chip of glass in the vase.

He smiled at the knowledge that she would include Alexis and slyly nudged her foot with his. When her eyes shifted toward him, he swooped in and captured her attention with an all-consuming kiss. The dazed look in her eyes when he released her tempted him to repeat his actions, but he showed what he considered to be remarkable restraint and settled back against the cushions.

"Just reminding you who you're marrying," he explained when she silently questioned him, her fingers touching her lips without her own knowledge. He smirked. "Thought it might cheer you up."

Under his breath, he added for her ears only, "If you don't start acting somewhat happy about marrying me, you're going to screw up the undercover."

He was right. She knew he was right. She hated when he was right.

Sliding closer to him, she played with the hair at the back of his neck and teased his ear with her lips. "Sorry," she whispered. Then, "I love you."

"I love you, too," he returned, his voice suddenly hoarse. "If you don't stop that ear thing, I'm going to have to use this clipboard to cover up a… certain condition … and it will be your fault."

Her throaty chuckle nearly did him in, and just when he knew he could stand the sweet torture no longer, she stopped her assault and laid her head against his shoulder.

"Who did you pick as groomsmen?" she asked, her mind now fully on their assignment, ignoring the panic that still threatened to rise like bile in the back of her throat.

"Uh…" His mind had suddenly turned to mush, and he fumbled with the paperwork until he found the answer to her question. "Ryan and Esposito. Figured I'd never hear the end of it if I didn't ask them."

"You're probably right," she nodded against his shirt and pointed to the next question on the lengthy list: Flowers.

"Purple Canterbury bells with yellow and red roses."

He lowered the clipboard and shot her a surprised look. "_What_ are Canterbury bells?"

"They're a flower, Castle. Duh." She grinned, and he couldn't help but grin back. She was contagious when she smiled. "My favorite." A slight shadow darkened her face. "My mother liked them too – only she preferred the pink ones." She picked at something unseen on her jeans and shrugged. "I like the purples."

He gave her some privacy in her emotions and scribbled down her request. "Then purple ones it shall be."

Nudging her shoulder with his, he added, "By the way, that ear thing you were doing? Feel free to do it again when we're at home later."

_Home_. She really liked the sound of that word, and she liked even more that it was attached to Castle. It petrified her, and at the same time it calmed her. And it convinced she was either officially losing her mind … or officially head over heels in love.

They answered the rest of the questionnaire in a comfortable camaraderie, deciding on everything from colors (red and yellow) to ceremony style (mostly traditional with a few contemporary touches) to food (surf and turf). They surprised each other with some of their opinions – from the cake (multi-tiered with a fountain at the base – Rick's one main request) to the decorations (simple, natural, and romantic – Kate still didn't know why her preference surprised him) to the reception details (dinner and dancing – Kate's alternative to Rick's murder mystery game suggestion).

By the time the last blank had been filled in, Kate could feel her restlessness returning. Fortunately, she didn't have to wait more than a pair of minutes before a perky, young blonde called their names.

"Mr. Castle. Ms. Beckett. I'm Candy. I'll be planning your wedding with you." She shook their hands warmly and led them to an office that looked like something out of Brides magazine.

As they took their seats opposite her desk, Kate couldn't help but notice that Candy was the kind of girl who enjoyed flaunting her ample cleavage. She also couldn't help but notice – with a great sense of pleasure – that Rick didn't seem to care. His attention was solely on Kate with an occasional migration to Candy's face to process what she was saying.

Wondering why she was letting her fears distance herself from this man, she made a point of scooting her chair closer to Rick's, crooking her arm through his, and lacing their fingers together – making sure of course that her ring was prominently on display. The wink he sent her way told her that he knew exactly what she was doing, the rapid pulse at his wrist told her he liked it.

"So!" Candy exclaimed as she rifled through their paperwork. "Let's get started!"

* * *

><p>She watched them leave, arm in arm, and barely tamped down the sneer that curled at the corners of the mouth. This was really going to be too easy. As public as their relationship already was, it would be a breeze to dig up something that would bleed them dry of hush money. She frowned momentarily as it occurred to her that this fame may in fact make it more difficult to find a secret.<p>

Either way, by her calculations, another client loss would certainly put Miranda out of business. She smiled at the thought and went back to her tasks with a hum in the air. This one would be fun. The payoff would be legendary. The results would be everything she'd wanted… and maybe more.

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><p><strong>*~*~* Cue ominous music... Except not really - cuz I'd rather you write a review by clicking on that little link down there :)<strong>


	24. Chapter 24

"So…" Kate plopped to a seat next to Rick on the couch, tucking her feet beneath her and raising her coffee mug to her lips with both hands. "What is the blackmailer going to dig up on you?"

He huffed indignantly in her direction, but softened it with a boyish grin. "What makes you think the blackmailer is going to come after me?"

She shrugged. "Just figured you were the playboy and all – gotta be some kind of skeleton in your closet."

"And what about you – Miss Wild Child in her teens?" He leaned in, flopping an arm across her shoulders with a teasing tug. "Are there some pictures somewhere that I'm going to be very interested in seeing when the blackmailer finds them and sends them to you?"

"Hah! You wish," she retorted, poking him in the knee with her toe. He caught the foot she'd brought out and began to lightly massage it.

"Are you nervous about it?"

His quiet question incurred her full attention, and she nodded. "Yeah – I mean, sometimes people already know what they don't want people to know about them. Other times, it sneaks up on you."

"What would be bad enough for you to break off the wedding?" He kept the words light, but she could hear the ring of anxiety beneath them.

"Are you anticipating something reaching that level?" Her eyebrow rose curiously.

"No," he assured her. "Just … wondering."

"It doesn't really matter, though, does it?" Kate asked before thinking her words through. "I mean, it's just for an undercover thing – there's not an actual wedding on the line here." Too late, she saw his face fall and instantly regretted what she had said.

"Right." He set his mug down on the coffee table with a loud clunk, ignoring the dark liquid that sloshed over the edge. Standing, he let Kate's foot drop unceremoniously to the couch and smiled sadly down at her.

"I'm heading to bed," he told her, his voice tight. "See you in the morning."

Tears pooled in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks as she watched him walk toward his bedroom – _their_ bedroom. Why did she keep pushing him away? She felt so scattered – so free-falling right now. This was new to her – this feeling of 'rightness' and completion that she experienced with Rick. And something in her – the remnants of the wall, no doubt – was determined to thwart that happiness.

She sat in self-deprecating silence for about an hour, analyzing her flight reflex into the ground before returning their coffee cups to the kitchen sink and following the path Rick had already walked. He was on his side, facing his nightstand instead of her side of the bed – the fact that she already had a _side_ should have told her more than anything else about the permanency of their new relationship. She couldn't tell if he was asleep, or just pretending to be, but she slid beneath the sheets and scooted toward him. Spooning his frame with hers, she put her arm across him and rested her hand on his t-shirt-covered abdomen, pressing a soft kiss to his shoulder.

"I'm sorry," she whispered against the cotton that separated them physically, while aching to remove what separated them emotionally.

Sleep did not come quickly for Kate that night, and when it finally claimed her, it was not sweet. Dreams of gunshots and blackmailers and walls and engagement rings tormented her, and she tossed and turned fretfully, unable to escape the prison of her subconscious.

Next to her, Rick watched in agony as the woman he loved struggled with her demons. He hadn't been asleep – he'd heard her soft apology, felt the remorse in her embrace. At first, he'd thought Gates' undercover assignment would be the catalyst to cement the progress they'd been making in their relationship. Now, he was praying it wouldn't be the straw that broke them apart.

* * *

><p>From the corner of her eye, Kate watched Rick pace the bullpen, phone to his ear in a conversation that had become quite animated. Whatever it was, he looked happy. Strike that – he looked positively giddy.<p>

She turned her attention back to the ballistics report she'd been reading and was about to meander over to the murder board when a voice at her temple startled her.

"What do Piers Morgan Tonight, the Today show, and Ellen all have in common?"

Kate's forehead wrinkled as she swiveled to face him, his hands bracing his weight on either side of her chair. "They're all TV shows?"

"And so are we!" Despite the fact that she seemed utterly confused, he rambled on as though everything was clear, "Well, _we__'__re_ not a TV show – although that would be a pretty cool idea. Someone should do that. A hot detective has a hot writer following her around, solving cases."

"Yes, the screen would positively melt with all the hotness," Kate retorted wryly. "Now, what are you talking about?"

"That was Paula. Apparently we – you and I – hot 1 and hot 2…"

At Kate's fondly annoyed glare, he abandoned those monikers and hastened to explain, "We are the hottest (_he __couldn__'__t __resist_) thing in the gossip circuits right now… maybe even bigger than Brangelina or Demi & Ashton."

"Castle…"

He'd gone off track again. Right. Facts first, fun later. "Anyway, the talk shows have Paula's phone ringing off the hook! I agreed to Piers, Today, and Ellen… if that's okay with you, of course." When she didn't respond immediately, he interjected, "Too bad Oprah's off the air – she would eat this story up!"

"Whoohoo!" Ryan piped up from his place across the bullpen, and Esposito echoed the sentiment with a round of applause. "Mom and Dad are gonna be on TV!"

"And so it begins," Esposito teased as they joined the duo at Kate's desk. "Your picture is in the paper, a few TV show appearances, and before you know it you're just too famous to hang out with the likes of us."

"Stuff it," Kate ordered the other detectives. "Castle, I don't want to be on TV."

"Well, you don't want to marry me either, apparently, but part of being an adult is doing things you don't want to do. At least that's what Alexis tells me."

He tried to keep his tone light, but Kate heard the hurt that laced the words. She stood up and waved a finger at Ryan and Esposito. "You two, go back and interview the vic's next door neighbor again. I don't think she's telling us all she knows."

Turning the finger on Castle, she jabbed it into his chest. "You. Come with me."

When he didn't move right away, she grabbed him by the ear and nearly dragged him down the hall toward the ladies' restroom, ignoring his cries of "Apples! Apples!" along the way. She released him, only to shove him into the dingy room, and followed him inside.

"What was that all about?" she fumed, arms crossed, as she backed him against the sink.

The panic on his face was priceless. "What was what all about? I can't help it that we're popular …"

"That's not what I'm talking about, and you know it." She poked him in the chest with each of the last 4 words.

"I really don't." He held up his hands in surrender. "If I did, I would fix it."

The restroom door opened, and Kate turned her irritation toward the unfortunate soul who dared to interrupt. "It's occupied."

The rookie officer backed out of the room, mumbling something about a booty call under her breath, and Kate slammed the lock into place behind her.

"All that crap about me not wanting to marry you?"

He looked back at her, vulnerability and understanding mingling in his gaze. "That's the impression I got yesterday. Between the wedding planner and our conversation last night, it seemed like the last thing in the world you want to do."

She sighed, rubbing her face with her hands as she tried to put some semblance of sense into the words she wanted to say. "Rick…"

Sliding her palms up his chest, she closed her eyes for a moment before opening them with clarity and resolve. "I – I would be honored to marry you. Yesterday … It's not about that. It's just that everything is so weird right now. We'd just started a relationship, just started taking my wall apart – and now suddenly the wall is just a pile of dust and we're planning our fake wedding. It's just hard to find the line between what's real and what's for the undercover, and I'm feeling a bit – okay, a lot – upside down about the whole thing."

"Kate," He held one of her hands hostage, rubbing his thumb soothingly up and down her soft skin. "I haven't said a single thing over the past few days that I didn't mean."

Her mind replayed their conversations with alarming speed, and breathing became more of a struggle. "Rick …"

"I'm not asking you to marry me today, Kate. I'm not asking at all right now, for that matter. I told you – when I really ask you, it's going to be private and everything you deserve. But that doesn't negate the fact that I am completely and utterly in love with you, and while your mind may not be on 'forever' yet, mine is. Don't shut me out, Kate. Please." His eyes begged her not to pull away. "Just trust me."

She couldn't think of anything to say – he'd said everything she needed to hear and stole with his sincerity whatever words she might have formed. She spoke the only way left to her, framing his face with her hands and pressing her lips to his.

He clutched at her back, tightening her almost desperately against him, his lips taking over the kiss, coaxing the spark of desire into a raging fire. Kate gripped his collar, then the back of his head, then back to his collar, practically climbing up his body with need.

Reversing their positions, he pressed her into the sink and swallowed a ragged groan when she wrapped her legs around his waist. Her fingers flew down the buttons of his shirt, baring his chest to her happy sigh. Before she knew it, her arms were raised in the air to accommodate her own shirt as it was tugged free from her body.

"It's a shame there aren't cameras in here," Rick blurted out inanely between gulps of air. "This would give the blackmailer some great ammunition."

"Really?" Kate breathed, her lungs constricting as his tongue trailed a line across her chest. "_That__'__s_ what you want to talk about right now?"

He angled his hips in a way that had her slinging her arm toward the paper towel dispenser for support. "No," he mumbled into the ear he now held captive with his teeth. "Definitely not."

"Rick?" She momentarily forgot what she'd been about to say, a curse flying past her lips as waves of pleasure followed Rick's current activities. He chuckled softly, and her quiet laughter mingled with his, fading into a moan of contentment when his lips and hands found new territory to explore.

"Rick… Trust _me_," she finally managed to put a meaningful phrase together. When he lifted his head to meet her eyes with questions in his, she fought to engage her brain one more time. "I want – forever – with you. I do. Just give me time to find the page you're on and get there too?"

It was his turn to be speechless, her turn to take over. Words became unnecessary as other senses rose to the occasion … and God help any woman on their floor with a full bladder.

* * *

><p><strong><em>~*~*~*~ See that little review link down there? I'd love for you to click it... and then write something ;)<em>**


	25. Chapter 25

_**~*~*~ 2 weeks later ~*~*~**_

Rick stood in the kitchen, holding the contents of the priority mail envelope that had arrived for him today. He felt his stomach drop to the floor and a wave of nausea smacked him out of nowhere. Groping for a barstool, he sank to a seat and willed the dizziness to stop.

He hadn't expected this.

They knew the blackmailer would contact them; they'd been anxiously waiting for two weeks for the proverbial bomb to drop. Nothing. Until today. When he saw the large envelope addressed to him in block letters, no return address, he knew this was it. But, this was not how he thought it would happen at all. He wasn't prepared.

He rubbed his face wearily and dropped the material to the island, staring at it as though it would disintegrate before his eyes. No such luck. Voices drifted to him across the loft – laughing, carefree voices. His heart sank even further. Kate had been doing so well; they'd really been making some progress with their trust issues. She panicked less, seemed to feel more at home wherever he was, and was actually starting to get into this whole fake wedding planning thing. In fact, right now, she and Alexis were holed up in his daughter's room, looking at bridal magazines, trying to find the perfect dress.

How was he going to break this to her? What would this do to her? To them?

He didn't want to know. But he knew it was unavoidable.

Slowly, as though weighted down by some unseen force, he trudged upstairs to Alexis' room. Leaning against the doorjamb, he watched in silence for a moment, smiling at the picture the two made. Both lay horizontally across the younger girl's bed, legs bent at the knees, stocking feet up in the air, their heads close together as they laughed at some tacky dress they had just seen. The radio played in the background, and he couldn't stop a quiet chuckle as both sets of feet began bobbing to the latest song.

The sound alerted them to his presence, and Kate craned her neck toward the door to grace him with a dazzling smile. "Hi! Did you get any writing done?"

"A bit." He hesitated and saw the instant that realization shadowed Kate's face. "Alexis, can I steal Kate from you for a few minutes? I promise I'll send her back."

"Sure," Alexis glanced back and forth between the couple's somber faces. "I was going to make some snarky comment about not making so much noise this time, but you're not stealing her for …that…are you?"

Rick shook his head. "No. It's … case-related."

The redhead nodded soberly and bit her lip. "I was hoping the blackmail would never come. That they'd skip you guys or something." She shifted from her stomach to lie on her side. "I never thought I'd say this but I wish you _were_ taking her for a quickie."

"Me too, kiddo," her father answered, squeezing Kate's arm as she passed him on her exit from the room. After a second thought, he stuck his head back in Alexis' doorway. "I don't want to know how you know what a quickie is … but I could really live the rest of my life without hearing it from your lips again. 'Kay?"

Alexis rewarded him with a sad smile. "_No_ problem."

He trailed after Kate, finding her in his office. Shutting the door behind them, he leaned against it with dread.

"Kate."

"It's okay, Rick. Whatever it is, you can tell me. It's not going to change the way I feel about you."

"It's not about me."

Her face scrunched in surprise, and she reached for the papers he held. "What is this?"

He didn't respond; there was really nothing to say. She'd have her answers by the time she finished reading. When she finally dropped to a seat in his desk chair, he knelt in front of her, alarmed to see how white her face had gotten.

"Kate, sweetheart… It's going to be okay."

"My dad…" She was crying now, silent tears that left damp rivulets down her ashen cheeks.

"I know." He brushed some hair from her face and leaned in to kiss her nose. "I'm sure there's an explanation."

"I don't know how he can explain this any differently than what I'm looking at in black and white, Castle." She gestured to the papers now in her lap. "Police reports, photos… you can't get much more cut and dry than this."

He nodded and held her ice-cold hands, rubbing them in an attempt to coax the blood to return. "But the police reports and the photographs and whatever other evidence this guy has… they don't tell you what your dad was going through at the time. They don't tell you why you didn't know about it."

It was her turn to nod, and he could see the wheels turning in her mind as she processed her own thoughts. "Okay," she finally said. "You need to let Gates know that it's not the way we had it figured out. They're not blackmailing the bride or groom with information about themselves. It's about the other person."

"It means they're counting on me to love you so much that I will do anything to keep you from finding out about this. Which… if it wasn't for an undercover, I would totally be tempted to do just that. That changes some of our theories, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, it does." She accepted his offered embrace and breathed in his scent, feeling it wash over her like a comforting blanket. "I'm gonna call Dad."

"Wait." He gently grabbed her wrist as she moved to leave the room. "I think we need to reverse our roles here. If you go running off to confront your dad about this, it could tip off the blackmailer that I told you about the package he or she mailed to me. It could undo all the ground work we've laid so far."

She considered his words, agreeing after a moment, knowing he was right. "Okay, but – Castle… have him call me when you're done meeting with him. I want to hear whatever he tells you from _him_ directly. I need to hear it from him."

Holding her closer and longer than was necessary, Rick buried his nose in her hair and wished with every fiber of his being that he could take this pain away for her. It wasn't fair. He told her as much, and she clung more tightly to him as though wishing they could meld into one force that could face this together.

"I'm glad I have you, Rick," she whispered into his neck, feeling the thick swallow he gave in reaction to her words. "I'm used to going through things like this by myself."

He breathed a silent thank-you to the heavens for this small miracle. "I'm glad you don't have to go through life alone anymore, Kate."

She surprised even herself with the deluge of tears that burst forth with his words. Pulling back after a moment to brush inanely at the damp blotches that soaked his shirt, she sniffled once or twice and met his eyes.

"It's not just me, you know," she finally told him. "You don't have to handle stuff by yourself anymore, either. We have each other, right?"

Rick thought briefly about his own murder board for her mother's death – a couple of clicks of technology and he could rid himself of this secret that hung over him like a ton of iron. He debated it … but he pushed it back into the recesses of his mind for another day and simply smiled at Kate. "I like that idea."

Something flickered in her gaze at his choice of words, but he wasn't the only one that could shove things to the theoretical back burner. Nodding, she stood on her tiptoes to receive the kiss she knew he would gladly give her. She lingered as panic threatened to overtake her again. He was hiding something from her.

"Go call my dad," she told him, forcing her voice to stay light as she headed to find her own cell phone. She felt the separation keenly, a sudden chill causing a shiver to run down her spine. "I'll call Gates."


	26. Chapter 26

"Jim." Rick stayed seated on the park bench, but offered his hand in a firm grip to Kate's dad.

"Rick." The older man seemed uneasy. "You've already asked me for permission to really propose to Kate when the undercover is done. And I said yes."

Rick gave a faint smile of recollection and nodded silently. Jim Beckett took a seat next to him and fixed him with a steady stare. "What's up?"

In that moment, Castle would have given anything to be anywhere else. But he wasn't. He was here – in the park – about to confront the man who gave life to the woman he loved. Confront him with a secret that had the potential to change everything in the way father and daughter related to each other.

"Jim… the blackmailer. He didn't come after me."

Mr. Beckett's face grew dark. "Katie."

Rick shook his head. "Jim – he dug up something on you. Something Kate doesn't know – didn't know… until today."

The father in him ached as the father next to him seemed to wither in front of his eyes. "I… I always hoped she would never…"

"I'm sure you did," Rick acknowledged. "I can see why." He paused, holding Jim's gaze with his own. "I wouldn't want Alexis to ever find out that I …"

Jim interrupted him before he could finish his thought. "That I got so drunk one night that I hit and killed a pedestrian crossing the street?" He spat out the words bitterly, covering his eyes briefly with a trembling hand as the emotion of his secret captured him.

"Or that it was _after_ I was getting treatment for my alcoholism?" Jim continued.

"To know how disappointed Katie would be in me," his voice broke. "That was almost worse than knowing that I took a life. Almost."

Rick looked at his hands, shaken by the man's admission, even though the proof had been plain from the beginning. "And Montgomery…?"

"He took care of things. I barely remember so much of that time – it's all such a haze – I don't even know if Katie was working for him yet or not. I don't think she was – it was still pretty soon after her mom's death. Montgomery was at the station when they brought me in. I don't even know how he knew me…"

Flashbacks of the night of Roy's death careened through Rick's brain like missiles, and he closed his eyes against the onslaught. Yes, he would have known Jim Beckett, known who he was anyway.

"I don't know how or what he did, but he made any criminal charges go away," Jim was saying. "He helped me make restitution to the victim's family, helped me get into counseling, put the fear of God into me as to what would happen to Katie if I didn't get my act together."

The implications of his words hit Rick hard. "So… Kate didn't save you from your alcoholism?" Her watch … for the one she saved … she would be crushed.

"Oh, she did," Jim reassured him, and Rick visibly sagged in relief. "They both did – just in their own ways."

"She wants you to call her," Rick told him. "When we're done. She wants to hear it from you herself."

Nodding soberly, Jim clamped an unsteady hand on Rick's shoulder. "I'm sorry that I let this get sprung on her – and you – out of the blue like this. I just … when she never found out about it, the more years that passed, I just wanted to put it all behind me and make a fresh start." His eyes watered, and he looked away to compose himself. "She'd already been through so much."

* * *

><p>When Rick made it back to the loft, there was no sign of Kate in the main living area. He heard noises from the kitchen and checked that room, but it was only Alexis.<p>

"She's taking a bath," his daughter told him. "Her dad called, and she went into your office to talk to him. Then she texted me and told she was going to soak in the tub. But she hasn't run any water yet – and that was about 30 minutes ago."

She stopped spreading peanut butter on the apple she'd sliced and regarded her dad worriedly. "I heard her crying, Dad. Are you guys okay?"

"I think so," he told her honestly. "She just found out something about her dad that's kinda hard to hear."

Nodding, Alexis went back to her task and willingly leaned into his embrace when he enfolded her into a fierce hug. He kissed the top of her head with a loud smacking noise and nearly wept when she giggled as she had when she was younger. His father's heart was about broken in two after his conversation with Jim Beckett, and he couldn't bring himself to release his daughter just yet.

"I promise never to put you in that kind of position," he whispered thickly to Alexis.

She smiled sadly. "I know you won't, Dad." Then, "I wish Kate's dad had been more like you."

"He is, Alexis. He's a good dad. He just … Her mother … There's a whole set of dynamics in play here." He gave her shoulders a quick squeeze. "I'm gonna go check on Kate."

He could hear her muffled sobs as soon as he neared his bedroom. Placing his hand against the doorjamb, he paused for a moment to collect his own emotions before stepping quietly inside. She was curled up on the bed, still fully clothed but hugging her bathrobe, clutching her watch in one hand and her mother's ring in the other. Her shoulders shook with the force of her tears, and he instantly knelt on the floor in front of her and brushed away the few tendrils of hair stuck to the dampness on her face.

"Rick … he … he …"

"I know, babe. I know." He cried with her, resting his forehead against hers, kissing her tears away as they mingled with his own.

"I feel like my mother died all over again – like Roy died all over again. It hurts – so damn much."

"I wish I could undo this for you," he confessed. "Or at least fix it." He met her eyes helplessly. "I can't do either one."

"You're holding me," she whispered raggedly. "It's enough for now."

Her choice of words was not lost on him, and he drew her into a slow, intoxicating kiss with emotions so intense that they were both struggling for air when their lips finally parted. Moving around the bed, he slid in behind her and gathered her against him, feeling the strength willingly drain out of him as she claimed it for her own. He kissed her neck, her ear, her temple; resting his cheek against her hair, he stroked from her abdomen to her hip to her shoulder until he could tell she had drifted into an exhausted slumber.

"I love you, Kate," he murmured softly, reveling in the soft sigh she emitted in response.

Anger boiled deep within him as he lay there. Anger at her father. Anger at Montgomery. Anger at the people who killed Johanna Beckett. Anger at the blackmailers. Anger at himself for keeping secrets from the beautiful woman who finally trusted him in her vulnerability.

"Someone is going to pay for hurting you," he promised her, but only a groggy mumble was given in reply. Grazing her forehead with another light kiss, he surrendered to the bone-deep weariness that beckoned to him.

* * *

><p><strong>~*~*~ I promise the angst will be temporary! I hate angst ... I much prefer fluff. (By the way, have I mentioned that reviews feed my fluff muse? Just a thought ... haha)<strong>


	27. Chapter 27

**_A/N: I went back and edited this chapter (in case you read it already this morning) to fix some minor glitches that didn't make it past my allergy-meds induced haze last night or this morning. Thanks to the reader who pointed them out!_**

* * *

><p>"So, what suspects do you have so far?" Captain Gates looked back and forth between her detective and the writer.<p>

"Well," Kate sighed. "There's our wedding planner, Candy."

Rick glanced at her in bemusement at the distasteful way she'd ground out the name. Making a mental note to tease her about her jealousy later, he instead turned his attention back to the imposing figure behind the desk.

"I have my money on the receptionist," he contributed. "She seemed a little too interested in us while we were filling out our paperwork."

"Then, there's the office boy."

Kate shot him an incredulous look. "The _office __boy_?" she chided jokingly. "What decade did you wake up in this morning?"

A retort about exactly how he'd woken up this morning leapt to his lips – something involving her and him and a long shower – but he wisely suppressed it, proud of himself for realizing that neither Kate nor Gates would appreciate his humor right then. Instead, he merely shrugged his shoulders. "Well, what would you call him? He distributes the mail, gets people coffee, runs errands, etc. etc. Plus he seemed to have a little crush on you when we stopped by the other day to drop off our deposit for the caterer."

Her eyes lifting momentarily to the ceiling, she smiled in spite of herself and deferred to his observations. "Okay, there's also the _office __boy_."

Gates sat back in her chair and nodded slowly, tapping her finger against her bottom lip and looking at the reports and theories they'd submitted to her thus far. "And the blackmailer's note said what?"

Rick shifted uncomfortably. He'd been grateful that Gates so far hadn't asked what the blackmailer had on them. Kate's eyes had become very interested in something on the floor, and he took mercy on her by answering the question on his own.

"Uh… well, without getting into specifics…"

Gates waved him off. "I don't care what he or she is holding over you. I want to know when they want the money and how much they want."

"100,000 dollars," Kate answered softly, gaining some confidence from inside herself and raising her gaze to the woman in front of her. "They want the drop to take place at the mayor's Halloween party tonight."

"They didn't mention anything about cancelling your wedding plans?"

"No." Rick shook his head. "We're thinking that they might ask us to do that after they get the money."

Gates handed them a black duffel bag heavy with what Kate knew to be dummy money.

"Detective Beckett…" Gates began.

Kate raised a hand to stop the order before it could start. "I'll make sure he behaves."

"I was going to say that you can brief Detectives Ryan and Esposito to utilize them as backup for the evening," Gates gave her a wry smile. "But your suggestion is good, too."

As they left the precinct on their way to lunch, Castle leaned close to Kate and whispered into her ear. "Speaking of the Halloween party… I took the liberty of buying you a costume when I got mine."

"Oh no," Kate groaned with trepidation. "I'm not going to have to squeeze myself into a Playboy bunny outfit or anything, am I?"

His eyes flashed mischievously. "No… but that's not a bad idea." Throwing his arm around her shoulders, he added, "But there would be no squeezing needed. You're still a little thin from…"

She raised her hand to brush across her shirt where the fabric covered the puckered scar that was looking less angry but still hurt like the dickens on cold fall mornings like the ones they'd been having lately. "Yeah."

A sudden impish streak had her grinning up at him. "It's all this… umm…_exercise_… I've been getting lately."

Growling quietly, he nipped at her ear and delighted in the giggles that surrounded him in reply. "On second thought, I don't want anyone else seeing you dressed like a Playboy bunny. But I might go back and buy one for my own viewing pleasure."

Kate's laughter turned a bit breathless. "Only if you wear that Space Cowboy costume Alexis was telling me about the other day. For _my_ own viewing pleasure."

"That can be arranged."

The duo continued their trek down the street, tucked closely together, oblivious to the person who was watching their every move.

* * *

><p>"Elektra?" Kate's disbelieving voice carried into his office, and he bit back a grin.<p>

"It's too late to get a new costume, Kate," he called over his shoulder toward his bedroom where she had gone to change. "The party starts in an hour."

He heard her muttering something in response and chuckled. When the shower started without further discussion, he briefly considered joining her but ultimately decided to look at Johanna's case files one more time while Kate was otherwise occupied. It wasn't long before he'd become engrossed in one particular report, and he nearly fell out of his chair when Kate called his name. Hurriedly logging out of his digital murder board, he tried to pinpoint exactly where she was while trying to calm the pounding of his heart.

"Castle!" she appeared in the doorway that connected the office and the bedroom, hands on her hips. Her Elektra-clad hips…

He gulped as pure unadulterated lust slammed into him, the sight of her skin-hugging costume tightening his lungs and other parts further south. "Wow."

She blushed and tried to appear nonchalant about his blatant desire for her, but he could see that it pleased her. "Aren't you going to change? Or are you going as a somewhat annoying mystery writer this year?"

"I've got plenty of time," he assured her.

"Castle, we've got to leave here in 5 minutes."

His eyes shot to the clock in surprise. He'd been studying the case files for longer than he thought – he was lucky she hadn't caught him at it. "Sorry, sorry."

Scrambling toward the bedroom – and the costume that waited for him in the closet – he couldn't resist another parting compliment. "You look – wow, Kate. I mean, seriously."

He almost stumbled over the bed as he turned for one more look at her stunning sexiness. "I'm really glad I bought this one instead of renting it. I have plans for that costume, Kate. Bedroom plans."

Just when she thought he was maturing a bit… She grinned and rolled her eyes, then waved him toward the closet to get dressed. When he emerged a moment later, she stared at him in great amusement.

"Angry Birds, Castle? Really?"


	28. Chapter 28

Kate sat up abruptly, the luxurious sheets tangled at her hips, her mind trying to sort through the haze between sleep and reality. The more reality encroached, the more she ached for sleep. Literally. Her head throbbed, her body had pangs in places she didn't even know existed, and her inner shivers felt suspiciously like the marks of a high fever.

"Kate?" The soft question preceded the curious head that peered around the corner of the bedroom. He seemed relieved when she blinked bleary eyes at him, and the tray of soup and tea he'd brought with him clattered to a resting place on her bedside table. Brushing some hair from her damp forehead, he kissed the trail his fingers had taken and looked at her searchingly.

"How are you feeling?"

Her groan gave him any answers he needed, and he hid a smile as she fell back against the pillows.

"Did I get hit by a train at the mayor's Halloween party?" she asked, wincing at how weak her voice sounded.

His forehead knitted together in confusion. "Whose party?"

"The mayor's Halloween party," she repeated in mild annoyance. _Why isn't__he __listening __to __me?_

"Kate, hon, the mayor didn't have a Halloween party."

"Yes, he did," she struggled to sit back up but gave up when she could tell the effort would be futile.

Pushing her hair out of her face, she looked up at him in consternation. "You bought me an Elektra costume. You dressed up like the red Angry Bird. We were going to meet the blackmailer."

_What __is __she __talking __about? _He pursed his lips in a mixture of amusement and concern. "Well… as much as I'd like the idea of seeing you in an Elektra costume, I think you're a little confused."

Her brow wrinkled, and he was afraid for a moment that she might cry. "But…"

Running his index finger down her nose, he chuckled softly. "You've been sick since last night," he told her. "High fever, cough – Lanie suspects pneumonia."

"But…"

"She said it could have been lying dormant since the shooting – all that time you were in bed, recovering, and it finally manifested itself."

"But…"

Goodness, she was cute when she was baffled.

Masking a grin by leaning in to brush her forehead with another kiss, he sat back on the bed and drew patterns on her wrist with a light touch. "She gave you a shot while she was here, and she wrote a prescription after talking with your personal physician. There's an antibiotic on the table there," he nodded to her left. "And some soup and crackers and tea so you don't have to take it on an empty stomach."

"So…" she was grasping for solid mental footing, and he let her, intrigued by the dream she'd so obviously had. "We didn't meet with Gates and tell her who our suspects were?"

He shook his head.

"And I didn't promise Gates that I'd make sure you behaved?"

He laughed. "No."

"And… we didn't talk about a Playboy bunny costume for me or a Space Cowboy costume for you?"

His eyebrow arched. "No, but I like the sound of that first one."

"And… you don't have some kind of murder board for my mom's case on your computer?"

_Oh, __dear __Lord. _He froze. Icy cold fear squeezed his heart until it physically hurt, and he searched her gaze for confrontation. There was none – only confusion and frustration as she tried to make sense of the jumbled images still tumbling through her brain. A cautious peace slowly restored itself.

"What kind of dream did you have?" he teased casually, forcing his voice to convey lighthearted ribbing instead of trepidation. Putting the back of his hand gently against her forehead, he frowned. "I don't think your fever has gone down any. I'm going to get your next dose of ibuprofen. Be right back."

She mentally replayed their conversation in his absence and finally placed a fuzzy finger on what was bothering her. He had denied everything else – except for the murder board. Then, he'd merely changed the subject and left the room.

"Here you go," he said upon his return, holding out two small brown pills and handing her the mug of tea to rinse them down.

She swallowed obediently then clutched at his sleeve. "Castle… you don't … you're not working on my mother's case behind my back, are you?"

Sighing, he sat down next to her and rubbed her fingers tenderly. His face was sober, and she fought the urge to vomit. "Kate, that question needs a longer answer than I can give right now."

A sinking feeling pooled in her chest, and if she'd felt well, she would have put up more of a fight. As it is, she barely had enough energy to process his next words.

"Ryan and Espo are already downstairs waiting for me. Gates brought them in on the sting when it was clear you were in no condition to help me out. I promise we can talk about this when I get back."

That garnered her attention. Her eyes snapped to his in curiosity. "Where are you going?"

"To the drop with the blackmailer," he explained patiently, taking her tea cup and placing it back on the tray. "Which is _not_ at the mayor's non-existent Halloween party."

He stood. "Alexis is upstairs." Handing her cell phone to her, he indicated one of the numbers on the dial pad. "I put her number on speed dial. Call her if you need anything before I get home."

"Rick," she called hoarsely before he could take very many steps away from her. "Be careful?"

"Always."

And then he was gone. She was left to her own devices – his laptop tauntingly calling to her from his office. Would it hurt to snoop around a bit?

"Later," she muttered into the gathering darkness as she collapsed onto the bed with a fragile sigh. Right now, she wanted sleep more than answers. Sleep – and a blessed reprieve from the drum section that had taken up residence in her head.

* * *

><p>The alternating rings and buzzes of her cell phone against the nightstand finally coaxed Kate from a drugged slumber. Rubbing her eyes in an effort to rid her mind of the vestiges of cobwebs left behind by her dreams, she groped for the phone, punched the button, and managed to hold it to her ear. Her muscles were so weak that it felt like lead against her fingers.<p>

"Beckett," she croaked, struggling to sit up and focus on whatever the caller was saying.

"Beckett – it's Castle." Only it wasn't Castle. It was Esposito. Kate felt her heart drop into her stomach even as her stomach rose into her throat.

"No." She physically shook her head, though there was no one in the room to see her.

Kate stumbled out of bed and reeled into the living room on quivering legs, putting her hand to her hand to quell the dizziness that had the floor and the ceiling trading places.

"No," she said again, unwilling to listen to the disjointed words she could pick out from the cloud that surrounded her.

"Stabbed … hospital … unconscious … Ryan … pick you up…" He was probably speaking in complete sentences, but she couldn't process anything past syllables and phrases.

"No," she whispered again. Fear paralyzed her, and a sob rose in her throat.

And as the last few years flashed through her memory, everything went black


	29. Chapter 29

"Welcome back, beautiful."

Castle's eyes squinted against the harsh glare of light that invaded his senses and slowly opened to focus on the face of his favorite medical examiner.

"Ugh," he groaned, lifting a hand to his aching head and frowning at the tangle of tubes, needles, and wires that accompanied him.

"What happened?" He heard the slur in his words and grimaced.

"You ended up on the wrong end of the blackmailer's knife is what happened," Lanie said crisply. "I don't know why men have to play the hero all the time. Goin' and gettin' yourself laid up in the hospital with 50 stitches and a concussion – just to have war wounds to brag about."

She paused her chastisements long enough to reach up and adjust the IV bag that hung from the hook over his bed, handing him a plastic cup of water when he began moving his dry mouth and tongue around like a cat.

"Candy."

"I think we'll just stick with water," she told him. "Drink it slowly."

"No," he winced at the pain searing his chest. "I meant – the blackmailer was Candy."

"Ah." She took the cup when he had drained it and held his wrist, checking his pulse in time with her watch. "I sent Alexis and your mother home about two hours ago – wasn't anything they could do but fret in uncomfortable chairs until you woke up. Figured they might as well worry at home. I'll call them and I'll go get the nurse in a minute. After I see for myself that your vitals are holding up."

Rick scanned his surroundings as best he could, but his wounds left him with limited movement and he settled for sighing in frustration. "Where's Kate?"

Lanie shook her head and 'tsked' affectionately under her breath. "Talk about stubborn, mule-headed people …"

Stepping away, she gestured to the side of the room previously blocked from his view. Kate lay still and pale in the other bed, a monitor tracking her vital signs with a somber beep-beep-beep. Rick pushed himself to a sitting position, ignoring the white-hot lightning bolt that shot through his body at the sudden movement. "What -?"

"She passed out after Javi called to tell her that you'd been hurt. Alexis finally came downstairs to answer the door after Kevin resorted to yelling that he was about to break it down. Found her in a heap in the middle of the living room."

"Is she – is she okay?"

Lanie's expression softened, and she patted his wrist. "She'll be fine after a couple of days in here. Her fever was 104.6 when they brought her in, she's dehydrated, and she's been in some sort of febrile delirium off and on all night. Going on about superheroes and Space Cowboys and the mayor and murder boards."

She smiled to reassure him as she moved the sleeve of his hospital gown aside to check the bandages that covered his wounds. "You know," she muttered softly as she readjusted the fabric. "You two will have quite the story to tell your grandchildren one day – matching scars."

Castle chuckled slowly through the morphine haze that engulfed his brain and kept his eyes riveted worriedly on Kate. "How'd we end up in the same hospital room? They don't usually…"

"That was my idea," Lanie admitted with a wink. "For my own sanity. I knew once one of you was awake, I'd have my hands full keeping you away from the other one's room. This way, you all can make googly eyes at each other all you want, and I don't have to hear any whining or chase down the hallway after you."

Satisfied that he was indeed doing well, Lanie stepped back and patted his hand to borrow his attention from Kate for just a moment. "Do you need anything before I let everyone know you're awake?"

He started to shake his head then paused, lips parted as if to speak. After a few seconds, he shook his head again – but not very convincingly.

"What is it?" the pretty medical examiner asked him. "Do you want some more water? Are you in pain somewhere?"

She began fussing over him, poking and prodding gently in the areas that might be hurting, when he covered her hand with his. "I'm fine, Lanie. Thank you. I just –"

He hesitated again, and Lanie waited (somewhat) patiently for him to work past the drugs to form the words he was looking for. "I don't suppose you could move my bed next to Kate's?"

Her face was a mixture of mild annoyance and fond tolerance. "I have already pushed protocol enough by getting you in the same room. Why don't you charm one of those cute nurses that will be coming in here in a few minutes? See if _they__'__ll_ throw protocol out the window for a wink from your baby blues."

Nodding groggily, Castle turned back toward Kate and forced himself to be content just to have her in his eyesight – to simply watch her in an attempt to tamp down the glaring awareness that they had nearly both lost the other.

When Lanie returned about a half hour later, having called Castle's daughter and Ryan and Esposito, she was not all surprised to see the two beds moved into the center of the room. Both patients were still close enough to their original locations to allow the machines and IV bags to stay plugged in without stretching too far, but now their beds were nearly touching. Rick and Kate were both asleep, and tears welled in Lanie's eyes when she spied their clasped hands over the scratchy blankets. She moved quietly to check their vitals and, when she was convinced they were stable, she stepped out of the room and wearily plodded down the hallway. Real love – like the kind Rick and Kate had – didn't come around often enough.

* * *

><p>"Dad! Hands where I can see them!"<p>

Kate hid a blush as Rick obediently placed his hands back on top of his own blanket instead of wandering under hers as they had been before Alexis' teasing chastisement.

"I think it's time to move your beds back to where they're supposed to be," his daughter continued with a covert wink at Kate.

"But I like my bed being over here," Rick whined, drawing an eye roll from Alexis.

"You're just mad at me for getting stabbed," he continued, his voice petulant.

"I told you earlier, Dad – I'll wait to get mad until you're out of the hospital." Her smile softened her words. "I'm going to go down to the cafeteria and get a snack. Do you guys need anything?"

When they both shook their heads in the negative, she left them alone, and Kate spoke up quietly, "So, it was Candy, huh?"

He nodded. "Yeah, you'll have to ask Espo and Ryan what they found out in the interrogation. I was sort-of indisposed."

She returned his crooked grin and ran her hand through her hair, grimacing at how nasty it felt to her touch. "I can't wait to get out of here and take a nice, long shower."

His eyes sparked. "I think that sounds like a great idea."

Laughing at the undisguised leer coming from the man she loved, Kate replied, "You can't take a shower yet, Casanova." She fingered the outline of the bandage that covered his wound, and her gaze clouded.

"A bath then," he pressed, trying to ease the guilt he saw behind her eyes.

She laughed softly. "I think that could be arranged."


	30. Chapter 30

_**~*~*~ 3 weeks later ~*~*~**_

"That was Gina," Rick explained with a grimace as he re-pocketed his cell phone. He seemed nervous.

"She's riding me about the chapter I promised her by tonight," he responded to the question on her face. "I need to go home and see if I can make any progress on it before she hunts me down and holds me hostage." Shuddering at the thought, he looked around at the nearly empty bull pen. Thanksgiving was only two days away, and the city had been surprisingly quiet – as far as crimes went.

"Unless you think we'll get a case…?"

Kate grinned at the hopeful wistfulness blatantly painted across his handsome features. "I think all the criminals have taken a vacation," she teased apologetically. "Go home."

Her eyes darkened as he leaned in for a parting kiss, and she fingered the lapel of his sport coat, adding sultrily, "Write a sexy scene, and when I get home, we can act it out. You know – to make sure it's believable."

His face lit up, desire swirling in his gaze, turning the blue to nearly black. "Suddenly, I feel … very … inspired." Kisses punctuated his hoarse declaration, and he reluctantly pulled back with a rueful glance around the room. Fortunately, nobody seemed to be paying any attention to the couple – and even if they had, they would think little of it at this point.

One more stolen kiss and then, "I'll see you later. Hurry home?"

She nodded and turned back to the case file she was finishing, unable and unwilling to banish the smile that had crept across her face with his kisses. Good grief, she loved that man. He had wormed his way into her heart over the past few years, and she couldn't get him out – didn't want to get him out. She felt like a lovesick teenager, all gaga over the latest crush, but she knew instinctively that this went far deeper and truer than a mere infatuation.

Fingering the ring that he'd insisted she keep wearing (although, in truth, he hadn't needed to insist that much), she indulged in a few minutes of self-reflection and gratitude. Yes, he still drove her nuts sometimes. Yes, he still acted like a nine-year-old sometimes. Yes, he had kept from her the fact that he was working on her mother's case without her knowledge. But she loved him. Her thoughts drifted to the day after they'd both been released from the hospital.

"_C'mere," he asked her as she walked past his desk. She fought against the ache in her heart, letting him pull her down onto his lap and closing her eyes in satisfaction when his arms slid around her waist to clasp against her stomach. _

"_I need to tell you something." Shifting slightly, he reached with one hand and clicked a button that breathed life into the large screen to their left. Her face stared back at her – a web of other familiar photos flanking her picture. She stiffened, and his hands tightened his hold. _

_His lips at her ear, he whispered apologetically, "I'm sorry for keeping this from you."_

"_So you **have** been working on my mother's case?" She twisted her neck to meet his pleading gaze. "What happened to leaving it alone for now?"_

"_I __needed __**you **__to __leave __it __alone __for __now,__" __he __began, __proceeding __to __explain __the __envelope __and __the __phone __call __and __the __terror __that __had __gripped __him __at __the __thought __of __losing __her __again._

Kate had surprised herself as much as him with her reaction that day. With a startling clarity, she had realized that it felt good to have someone shoulder the burden for her for a while. Understanding that she needed him, understanding the gift he had given her – both in protecting her and in keeping her mother's case alive – she had captured him with her kisses until neither of them could see straight. She'd gotten around to telling him all of her epiphanies – eventually.

Her phone vibrating against her desk brought her out of her memories, and she hurried to answer the call. "Beckett."

"Hey Beckett – we've got a body drop."

It had taken her nearly all of these last few weeks to convince herself not to flinch every time Esposito's voice carried to her over the phone. "Where?" her voice remained brisk, the fear reflex gone but the emotions that accompanied it still lingered.

He gave her the address, and she jotted it quickly down on a stray post-it note. _Why __does __this __sound __so __familiar?_

She thought briefly about calling Rick then decided against it. He really did need to write, and he would be looking for every excuse to avoid doing so. Plenty of time for more fun means of procrastination when she got home.

Grabbing her coat, she hurried out of the bullpen, into her vehicle, and drove toward the address that Esposito had given her. As soon as she pulled into a parking spot off the street, she recognized the location. This was the bookstore where Castle had been signing books when she'd decided it was time to get off her duff and talk to the man. She had waited too long after her surgery, unfairly relegating him to the bottom of her priority list. And yet, he had only briefly held it against her, more to protect himself than to hurt her, she suspected.

Kate took a steadying breath and got out of the car, heading into the bookstore, her hand at her gun out of habit. Ryan, Esposito and Lanie were hovering around something on the floor – the body, she guessed – so she made her way toward the trio. As they parted in greeting, with knowing smiles in hindsight, she did a double take and halted in her tracks.

"What the –?"

A large cutout of someone (she assumed it was Castle) lay cardboard-side-up on the floor, a single red rose resting on the tripod-thing that enabled it to stand up – when it wasn't laying prostrate, that is. She bent to pick up the long-stemmed flower and whirled around, questions and accusations on her lips.

Those all died when she laid eyes on the man standing in front of her; the trio she'd been expecting were suddenly nowhere to be found. She wanted to snipe, _Was __the __cardboard __cutout __your __idea?_ but the words refused to form in her vocal chords.

A whispered, throaty "_Rick__"_ was all she could manage to utter.

He smiled, pleased that he had rendered her speechless, pleased that his name still spilled out on instinct. Stalking toward her, his eyes gleaming with purpose, he stopped millimeters from her lips and suddenly felt more grown-up than he had in his entire life.

"Hi," he murmured, his lungs surprisingly devoid of air, his brain scrambling to remember everything he'd wanted to say.

A shocked laugh lodged in Kate's throat, her eyes searching his face for an anchor. Finding it staring back at her, she relaxed into his kiss even though her heart pounded with awareness.

As Rick eased the kiss to a slow ending, she opened her eyes languidly and forced her vision into focus. "Hi." She hated the somewhat dreamy tone to her voice, but – dangit – he did things to her.

He chuckled in understanding and took her hands, squeezing them tightly despite the tremors that seized his own appendages. Tenderly tucking some brown curls behind her ear he kissed her knuckles, his eyes never leaving hers, and knelt in front of her. Tears flooded Kate's eyes, and she blinked rapidly to clear her line of sight. She didn't want to miss a second of the way he was looking at her – like he'd found the most priceless treasure in the world and had no intention of surrendering it.

"Kate –" This was not going as smoothly as he'd intended. So far, he'd managed to utter two words – neither of which hit on what he'd practiced so diligently.

_Think, man. You're the writer._

And he was. The writer. But she was … _Kate_. She was heat and tenacity and love all rolled into one.

That would make a nice start to this proposal. But, oh yes, there it was – he remembered now.

"Kate, you – you intrigued me right from the very beginning. You drove me crazy, too."

She breathed a chuckle, and he grinned around the lump that had taken up residence in his throat.

"And then … without even trying, you reeled me in. I told myself it was enough just to sit beside you every day, to ride along with you to a crime scene, to bounce ideas off of you even though I knew you didn't need my help to solve your cases."

"That's not true," she whispered, shaking her head with a smile.

"Ssh," he tugged on her hand jokingly. "This is my proposal. I'm the one who gets to talk." Appropriately and fondly chastised, she returned his laughter and smiled at him through her tears.

"I told myself it was enough to be your shadow – then your partner – then your friend. But it wasn't. It wasn't nearly enough."

Kate wished he'd let go of one of her hands so she could swipe at the moisture dripping down her cheeks, but instead, he seemed to read her mind and stood to his feet, using the back of his knuckles to gently dry her face. "I'm too old to kneel for that long anyway," he teased with a wink.

Sobering quickly, he held her gaze and heard his voice quavering with his own emotion as he finished what he'd been trying to say. "It wasn't enough. I wanted forever. With you."

He pulled another ring box from the pocket of his sports coat, and her brow knitted in confusion. She already had a ring – a stunning ring – why would he get her another one? As he popped the lid open, Kate stifled a gasp of awe. The ring encased in velvet matched the one on her hand, and she lifted curious eyes to his resolute ones.

"When I bought your engagement ring, the shop owner told me that there was a matching wedding band. Asked me if I wanted it." The corner of his mouth crooked in a rakish grin. "How could I not?"

"Rick…"

He shushed her again – this time with a light kiss – and added, "Kate… I think some part of me has wanted 'forever' with you from the moment I met you. I know I asked you once, and I meant every single word. But…it _was_ for the undercover assignment, and I wanted to make sure there were never any doubts that could sneak up on you down the road. So, I'm asking again. Katherine Beckett – would you marry me?"

She shuddered on a mixture of laughter and tears, and when she took a moment to speak, he felt like his heart might stop without further notice. Good thing Lanie was probably still lurking outside.

"Can I talk now?"

He threw his head back with a surprised guffaw and lightly tapped his forehead against hers. "Yes, you goofball," he echoed her words from the undercover proposal, and his breath caught when her shining smile told him she'd remembered.

"Yes, Rick. I want forever with you, too." Emotion clogged her voice again, but she pressed ahead, dodging his kiss long enough to add, "And Alexis and even your mother – if they'll have me."

"Are you kidding? They love you as much as I do." He was rewarded with the kiss he'd been seeking, her hands stealing around his neck and tangling in his hair. "Almost," he amended when they came up for air. "I don't think even _I_ love you as much I do."

Kate giggled and let out a delighted squeal when he picked her up at the waist and swung her around giddily. "That didn't even make sense," she admonished, fondly sweeping her fingers down his chest when he set her back on her feet.

She held her hand against his shirt and admired the ring she'd been given a few weeks ago. "It really is gorgeous, Rick."

"It's the Johanna."

Staring at him in wonder, she fought unsuccessfully against a fresh wave of tears that assaulted her. "The ring …"

He nodded, his voice thick. "Yeah – it nearly floored me. I already had it picked out and was paying for it when the guy told me its name."

Shaking her head, still amazed at the coincidence, she kissed him without any walls in the way and felt the change in his embrace when he too sensed her newfound freedom.

"I love you, Rick," she rasped, barely able to talk but feeling a desperate need to say what was on her heart. "Part of me loved you when you were just Richard Castle – this writer whose books helped me through the most painful time of my life."

His eyes widened with realization but she kept going, "Part of me loved you when you were just Castle, following me around, getting in the way, saving my life." She framed his face between trembling fingers and willed him to read between the lines and understand what she couldn't even really express with words. "But now you have my heart – completely, all of it."

Grinning wryly, she couldn't resist one more thought. "I'm not sure you're ever going to be 'Richard' though."

"That's perfectly fine," he assured her with a comical wince. It turned mischievous as another thought struck him. "Although, I may take this up as a challenge for some of our … more intimate … activities."

Taken over by the same thrill that always engulfed her when she was hit with the depth of his desire for her, she whispered something for his ears only and yelped in surprise when he scooped her into his arms.

"Let's go home," he decided, arousal coating his words. "I'm planning to hold you to what you just said."

"I would expect nothing less, Castle."

* * *

><p><strong><em>~*~*~*~ Only one more post after this one! Thanks so much for hanging with this story that got so much longer than I anticipated - your reviews and story alertsfaves and author alert/faves have meant the world to me! Stay tuned for the epilogue tomorrow ..._**


	31. Epilogue

_**~*~*~*~ Two months later ~*~*~*~**_

Kate Castle snuggled against her husband, shooting him an adoring smirk as the photographer snapped yet another picture. A flash of red to her left drew her attention, and she sighed in relief as Lanie gestured that they were needed at the reception. Fortunately, the photographer also spied the unspoken request and indicated that they should move into the ballroom so the rest of the evening's festivities could begin.

"I think my lips are permanently frozen like this," Rick murmured into this wife's ear, indicating the smile pasted on his face, as they obediently made their way through the Terrace on the Park's wedding facilities.

She giggled – Kate Beckett, no _Castle_, actually giggled. She couldn't help it; the day simply called for it. The ceremony had been everything she'd dreamed of since she was a little girl – but actually more so because she'd never dreamed of a love this deep or all-encompassing. Rick's eyes, full of his heart, held her gaze from the instant her dad had given her away to the millisecond before his lips had closed over hers at the minister's request.

They paused at the entrance to the ballroom reserved for their reception and held hands, leaning into each other's embrace, as they waited for Lanie to alert the DJ to their presence. "You look beautiful," he whispered to her after brushing her temple with a kiss.

Turning in his arms, she placed a finger to his chin and raked him up and down with an appreciative glance. "You look _really_ good in a tux." She placed her lips against his and mumbled into his mouth, "_Really_ good."

His eyes flashed and she suspected that, had the DJ not chosen that moment to announce them, he would have dragged her off to the nearest secluded room in a heartbeat.

"Ladies and gentleman! It is my pleasure to introduce to you – Mr. and Mrs. Richard Castle."

The room erupted with applause as the newlyweds made their grand entrance, and they had only seconds to digest all the beauty of the room before the DJ was segueing into the song Alexis had chosen for them as their first dance. His hand at her waist, her hand on his shoulder, their other hands clasped softly together, Kate couldn't help but flash back to that night at the Old Haunt when they had danced to music only Rick heard. How far they'd come since then.

_I've been a walking heartache_

_I've made a mess of me_

_The person that I've been lately_

_Ain't who I wanna be_

_But you stay right here beside me_

_And watch as the storm blows through_

_And I need you_

Kate's eyes brimmed again for what seemed the millionth time that day. She _had_ been a walking heartache – a mess – and he had been there during the storm, the lull, and the in-betweens. Her mother's case was still unresolved, but she had come to the conclusion that she didn't really need complete closure. She would like it, to be sure, and even ached for it some days. But the one thing she _needed_ was currently twirling her around the dance floor with tenderness in his touch and forever in his eyes.

_There's more here than what we're seeing_

_A divine conspiracy_

_That you, an angel lovely_

_Could somehow fall for me_

_You'll always be love's great martyr_

_And I'll be the flattered fool._

_And I need you._

Rick let his gaze drift over his lovely bride, his mind nearly unable to wrap around the fact that Detective Kate Beckett was actually his _wife_. He certainly felt the flattered fool and knew he would forever and always consider Kate's gift of love for him to be a great sacrifice on her part. She wasn't in his league – she was far above it. He could still see her standing before him with a book, waiting for his scrawl, captivating him even then with her eyes. They had been sad then, lifeless – he delighted every day now in the sparkle that looked back at him when his own eyes opened each morning. He loved her, adored her, desired her … _needed_ her. And he fully expected to do all of the above for the rest of his life.

_On my own I'm only_

_Half of what I could be_

_I can't do it without you_

_We are stitched together_

_And what love has tethered_

_I pray we never undo._

"Fat chance of that," Kate nuzzled into his ear. "If you ever try to untether me, I'll kill you."

He laughed. "I know you would. You sleep with a gun, remember?"

She ducked her head shyly. "I'm gonna have to stop doing that. We're going to need a safer place for it before too long." Her eyes misted again as she met his dawning gaze.

The hand at her waist migrated to her still-flat abdomen. "You mean—?"

She nodded, drawing her lip between her teeth, clutching his shoulders in elation when he spun her dizzily in a jubilant embrace.

_Cause God gave me you for the ups and downs_

_God gave me you for the days of doubt_

_And when I think I lost my way_

_There are no words here left to say, it's true_

_God gave me you._

Kate looked toward Alexis where she sat with the rest of the wedding party and rested her head on Rick's shoulder as their dance wound to a close. "I think Alexis picked out the perfect song for us."

"God knows we certainly had our days of doubt."

"Our fill of them" Kate agreed. Bringing his hand to her lips, she let her kiss linger. "No more."

He pulled her into a gentle embrace, still in awe at the way things had played out. Couldn't have asked for a happier ending if he'd written it himself. Responding to the infernal clinking of spoons against crystal, he dipped Kate at the waist and made the ladies (and even a few men!) swoon with a toe-curling kiss.

"You know – a lifetime isn't long enough," he informed her as they made their way back to the head table for the surf and turf dinner that waited for them.

She paused as he held her chair out from the table and kissed his chin before migrating upward to their home on his lips. Not nearly long enough, she agreed without words.

But it was enough for now.

_~The End~_

* * *

><p><strong><em>Thank you all so so much for all of your sweet words for this story! I hope you enjoyed it! <em>**

**_(Song lyrics taken from "God Gave Me You" by Blake Shelton)_**


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